Poems (Hornblower)/Solitary Imprisonment
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SOLITARY IMPRISONMENT.
Amid a gloom more terrible than darkness,
A cold, and still, and solitary gloom,
That with a feeble glimmering only makes
The wretchedness around just visible,
The friendless prisoner sits. He does not weep;
Nor from the depths of his dim solitude
Pom- one complaining tone—the warm, blest fount
Of human tears is thy, the sympathies
That bound him to a world of hopes and fears,
And joys and sorrows, yes,the holy ties
Which made Mm man among his fellow-men,
Are broken by despair. He cannot weep,
With head bowed mournfully upon his breast,
And aimless eye,and arms hung lifeless down,
He sits in desperation. On his soul
There dawns no hope; there comes no blessed gleam
Of human kindness, rising like salvation
Amid the pangs of death. How can he raise
Unto the awful power above, those eyes
Which never more must gaze on human kind?
How can lie crave for mercy from the God
He has offended, when from fellow-beings,
Frail, passionate, and suffering, like himself,
He hath been cast forth thus? Upon his sin
He muses in distraction, till his anguish
Swells in wild agony, and 'mid the waves
Of fear, and shame, and terror, comes the doubt,
The overwhelming doubt, that reason will forsake him,
Amid the utter wreck of all beside.
Then starting from the cold earth, high he spreads
Despairing arms—and with pale, quivering lips,
And outstretched head, and eyes that seem to crave
The sight of human face, as the lost mariner
Looks to the shore in sinking, still he stands,
And mute as death, to listen for a voice!
The very wind that howls against his grating
Is music to Mm, and his heart throbs quicker
To catch another, and a human sound!
No; the faint heavings of his own thin breath,
The slight convulsive movements of his heart,
Come chill upon him, and, with sickening ear,
He feels there is no other: the flushed cheek,
That had a moment warmed with mortal hope,
Fades to a damper paleness, and he sinks
Submissive on his stone; while his weak pulse
Flutters and falters, like a dying child's.
So day by day, and year by year, he sits,
The victim of his own and others' crimes;
A living monument! till, life itself
Become a lengthened curse, he trusts to die,
By spurning the scant food which only makes
That life a living death; he turns away
Disgusted from the offering; and though worn
Almost to frightfulness, a spectral form,
Rejects the proffered scrap, and calls on death,
As he would call a friend of youth, to save him!
O! wretched being! famine will not stay
To parley with despair; she urges him
Again, with double fierceness, to his food,
And the weak pulse revives, again to beat
The melancholy hours; and thus he drags
The remnant of bis being: no one sees
Or pities him; his varying agony,
Shut from the public view, disturbs no smile
Upon a happier cheek; no father craves
A blessing on his broken-hearted son;
No mother bends for him; no sister pours
Her young fond tears; no brother round the walls,
That bold the playmate of his infancy,
Walks in his manlier sorrow, wistfully
To gaze upon his cell; the busy world,
With all the tumult and the stir of life,
Pursues its wonted course; on pleasure some,
And some on commerce and ambition bent,
And all on happiness; while each one loves
One little spot, in which his heart unfolds
With nature's holiest feelings,—one sweet spot,—
And calls it home. If there is sorrow there,
It runs through many bosoms, and a smile
Lights up in eyes around a kindred smile;
And if disease intrudes, the sufferer finds
Rest on the breast beloved. Outcast of all,
He sickens and he dies; and, having finished
The expiatory pangs, and drank his cup
Of mortal suffering, is denied a grave,
And this is mercy—this is human mercy!
O! truly did he read the heart's deep folds,
And the dark hues of its hypocrisy,
Who cried in bitterness, Alas! for man,
Whose tender mercies in themselves are cruel!
A cold, and still, and solitary gloom,
That with a feeble glimmering only makes
The wretchedness around just visible,
The friendless prisoner sits. He does not weep;
Nor from the depths of his dim solitude
Pom- one complaining tone—the warm, blest fount
Of human tears is thy, the sympathies
That bound him to a world of hopes and fears,
And joys and sorrows, yes,the holy ties
Which made Mm man among his fellow-men,
Are broken by despair. He cannot weep,
With head bowed mournfully upon his breast,
And aimless eye,and arms hung lifeless down,
He sits in desperation. On his soul
There dawns no hope; there comes no blessed gleam
Of human kindness, rising like salvation
Amid the pangs of death. How can he raise
Unto the awful power above, those eyes
Which never more must gaze on human kind?
How can lie crave for mercy from the God
He has offended, when from fellow-beings,
Frail, passionate, and suffering, like himself,
He hath been cast forth thus? Upon his sin
He muses in distraction, till his anguish
Swells in wild agony, and 'mid the waves
Of fear, and shame, and terror, comes the doubt,
The overwhelming doubt, that reason will forsake him,
Amid the utter wreck of all beside.
Then starting from the cold earth, high he spreads
Despairing arms—and with pale, quivering lips,
And outstretched head, and eyes that seem to crave
The sight of human face, as the lost mariner
Looks to the shore in sinking, still he stands,
And mute as death, to listen for a voice!
The very wind that howls against his grating
Is music to Mm, and his heart throbs quicker
To catch another, and a human sound!
No; the faint heavings of his own thin breath,
The slight convulsive movements of his heart,
Come chill upon him, and, with sickening ear,
He feels there is no other: the flushed cheek,
That had a moment warmed with mortal hope,
Fades to a damper paleness, and he sinks
Submissive on his stone; while his weak pulse
Flutters and falters, like a dying child's.
So day by day, and year by year, he sits,
The victim of his own and others' crimes;
A living monument! till, life itself
Become a lengthened curse, he trusts to die,
By spurning the scant food which only makes
That life a living death; he turns away
Disgusted from the offering; and though worn
Almost to frightfulness, a spectral form,
Rejects the proffered scrap, and calls on death,
As he would call a friend of youth, to save him!
O! wretched being! famine will not stay
To parley with despair; she urges him
Again, with double fierceness, to his food,
And the weak pulse revives, again to beat
The melancholy hours; and thus he drags
The remnant of bis being: no one sees
Or pities him; his varying agony,
Shut from the public view, disturbs no smile
Upon a happier cheek; no father craves
A blessing on his broken-hearted son;
No mother bends for him; no sister pours
Her young fond tears; no brother round the walls,
That bold the playmate of his infancy,
Walks in his manlier sorrow, wistfully
To gaze upon his cell; the busy world,
With all the tumult and the stir of life,
Pursues its wonted course; on pleasure some,
And some on commerce and ambition bent,
And all on happiness; while each one loves
One little spot, in which his heart unfolds
With nature's holiest feelings,—one sweet spot,—
And calls it home. If there is sorrow there,
It runs through many bosoms, and a smile
Lights up in eyes around a kindred smile;
And if disease intrudes, the sufferer finds
Rest on the breast beloved. Outcast of all,
He sickens and he dies; and, having finished
The expiatory pangs, and drank his cup
Of mortal suffering, is denied a grave,
And this is mercy—this is human mercy!
O! truly did he read the heart's deep folds,
And the dark hues of its hypocrisy,
Who cried in bitterness, Alas! for man,
Whose tender mercies in themselves are cruel!