Poems (Angier)/The Prison Born

by Annie Lanman Angier

THE PRISON-BORN.

Two blue eyes open on the light,
 Of gloomy dungeon walls;
What sounds are these, which greet the ear?
 A helpless infant calls:
These faint and feeble wailings,
 My soul with sadness fill;
Heaven grant to shield the prison-born,
 And guard that soul from ill.

O! never more from Duty's path,
 May gentle woman roam—
What crime hath brought this mother here—
 Far from her childhood's home?
My answer comes in broken sobs,
 A sigh, and stifled moan;
Another's cheeks are wet with tears,
 The child weeps not alone.

Fair Babe, as in a desert waste,
 A sweet spring flower may bloom;
As kindly gleam from Mercy's lamp,
 May visit error's tomb:
As one bright ray, from Hope's lone star,
 Despair's dark night may cheer;
An angel in a sepulchre—
 Like these thou seemest here.

When Spartan mothers taught their sons
 A monster vice to spurn;
They showed the drunken Helot's shame,
 And bade them wisdom learn:
In future years, O! be it thine
 Temptation's voice to shun;
And in a palace thou mayest close
 A life in prison begun.

The moonbeam gathers naught of stain
 When resting on the earth;
Thus to the soul no taint need cling
 Though low its place of birth:
And cradled in a gloomy cell,
 The Prison-Born may wear
A crown, which some in palaces
 Might humbly beg to share.