My heart, sore stricken by grief's leaden arm,
Lags like a weary pilgrim knocking late,
And sigheth—toward thee staggering with its weight—
Behold Love conquered by thy son, the worm!
He stung him mid the roses' purple bloom,
The Rose of roses, yea, a thing so sweet,
Haply to stay blind Change's flying feet,
And stir with pity the unpitying tomb.
Here, take him, cold, cold, heavy and void of breath!
Nor me refuse, Mother almighty, death.
DESPAIR.
Thy wings swoop darkening round my soul, Despair
And on my brain thy shadow seems to brood
And hem me round with stifling solitude.
With chasms of vacuous gloom which are thy lair.
No light of human joy, no song or prayer.
Breaks ever on his chaos, all imbrued
With heart's-blood trickling from the multitude
Of sweet hopes slain, or agonising there.
Lo, wilt thou yield thyself to grief, and roll
Vanquished from thy high seat, imperial brain.
And abdicating turbulent life's control,
Be dragged a captive bound in sorrow's chain?
Nay! though my heart is breaking with its pain.
No pain on earth has power to crush my soul.
