Stanza Five

The painter lies who pencils death’s face grim                      25

With white bare butter teeth, bare staring bones,

With empty eyeholes, ghostly looks which fling 

Such dread to see as raiseth deadly groans,

For thou hast farely washed death’s grim grim face

And made his chilly finger-ends drop grace.

Summary:  The commonplace image of death was (and often is) as a death’s head, a bare grinning skull. To see the image is to cause fear. But now that God has reworked the nature of death it is wrong to represent death in that manner. God has washed Death’s face and now those skeleton fingers “drop grace.”

Notes

The painter lies who pencils death’s face: This opens the address of the stanza. It is a “lie” to paint death as a fearsome skeleton. The why this is false will explained in the couplet at the end. 

This style of representing death had long been a commonplace.

ghostly looks which fling / Such dread This is an interesting way to explain the effect of the artwork. The dread is in the painting. It is then flung into the eyes of the viewer. 

Such dread to see as raiseth deadly groans The dread inspired in the viewer is broadcast as “deadly groans”. Thus, we have an interesting movement of the dread: from the painting, into the eyes of the viewer, from the mouth of the viewer and presumably to yet another.

For thou hast farely washed death’s grim grim face

And made his chilly finger-ends drop grace.

The “thou” would be the “Lord” of the first line in the poem. From speaker generally concerning the representation of Death, the poet turns to the Lord and addresses him. The Lord has “washed” death’s “grim grim face” and has forced death to be a means of grace “made his chilly fingers”. 

Prosody:

This stanza contains a great deal of alliteration. 

Line 25: Painter – pencil

Line 26, B: bare, butter, bare, bones

Lines 25, 28, 29, 30: death, dread, deadly [a near rhyme within the line], death, drop

Lines 27: assonance: empty eyeholes

Lines 25, 28, 29, 30: grim, groans, grim, grim, grace. This progression in sound marks the progression in arguments: grim, groaning death becomes grace.

The painter lies who pencils death’s face grim. 25

With white bare butter teeth, bare staring bones,

With empty eyeholes, ghostly looks which fling 

Such dread to see as raiseth deadly groans,

For thou hast farely washed death’s grim grim face

And made his chilly finger-ends drop grace.