Under the wide and starry sky,
Dig the grave and let me lie.
Glad did I live and gladly die,
And I laid me down with a will.
This be the verse you 'grave for me:
Here he lies where he longed to be;
Home is the sailor, home from sea,
‘Wish’ might seem like a more natural choice of word here. This would of course mess up the rhyme, but the word ‘will’ carries more meaning than that. It is synonymous with ‘testament’: namely a charge placed on the bereaved to fulfill his requirements.
Requiem