27.05.2007, 13:21
Despondency
When thou didst leave me, Hope, why didst thou not,
In place of thy sweet presence leave Despair,
With her grim visage and distorted hair?
The past, the future, then had been forgot--
The soul, concentred on its blasted lot,
Had rested mute and desolate of care--
Had ceased to question where its treasures were,
And roamed no more the melancholy spot.
But now, too much remembering of the past
So huge the weight of gloom around me spread
That I, like one within a charnel cast,
Hear but the dirges ringing for the dead--
Feel all the pangs of life, and thought, and breath,
Yet walk I all the time with hand in hand of Death.
When thou didst leave me, Hope, why didst thou not,
In place of thy sweet presence leave Despair,
With her grim visage and distorted hair?
The past, the future, then had been forgot--
The soul, concentred on its blasted lot,
Had rested mute and desolate of care--
Had ceased to question where its treasures were,
And roamed no more the melancholy spot.
But now, too much remembering of the past
So huge the weight of gloom around me spread
That I, like one within a charnel cast,
Hear but the dirges ringing for the dead--
Feel all the pangs of life, and thought, and breath,
Yet walk I all the time with hand in hand of Death.