Poems on Several Occasions With Anne Boleyn to King Henry VIII. An Epistle. By Mrs. Elizabeth Tollet. The Second Edition |
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PSALM LXXXVIII. |
 | Poems on Several Occasions |  |
PSALM LXXXVIII.
O God of my Salvation! all the DayTo thee, and all the Night to thee I pray:
Admit my Cries before thee to appear;
And to my Supplication bend thine Ear.
With Woe my Soul is fraught; my fainting Breath
Approaches nearly to the Gates of Death:
I seem like one who to the nether Shade
Descends; in Vigour and in Force decay'd.
Where all, whom Death restores to Liberty,
Slain in the Grave, and unremember'd lye:
These from the Living, by a fatal Blow,
Thy Hand divides. And thou hast cast me low;
In deepest Caverns underneath the Ground,
Obscure with Night, and in the vast Profound.
Thy dread Displeasure presses on my Soul;
And o'er my Head the raging Tempests roll.
My dearest Friends, or who were such of late,
Hast thou remov'd, or turn'd their Love to Hate:
Confin'd in Dungeons, and oppress'd with Chains,
No Hope of Liberty to me remains.
With pining Grief my wasted Eyes decay:
To thee I spread my Hands, to thee I pray;
As each revolving Sun renews the Day.
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To the pale Nations of the Dead below?
What Pow'r of Art, or Miracle shall raise
Their vanish'd Being to recite thy Praise?
Who in the Tomb shall tell thy Mercy's Fame?
Or thy Veracity in Death proclaim?
Or shall eternal Night thy Marvels boast?
Or show thy Justice on the dismal Coast
Where Thought itself is in Oblivion lost?
But thee have I implor'd; with early Cries,
My Pray'r attends thee, e're the Morn arise:
O! wherefore dost thou thus my Soul repell?
And o'er thy Presence cast a cloudy Veil?
Thus have I languish'd from my tender Years,
And instant Death before my Eyes appears,
Press'd with thy Wrath, and frantic with my Fears.
Thy Indignation, and the conscious Dread
Of heav'nly Vengeance, overwhelms my Head;
Like rolling Billows, and the rushing Tide,
They break above, and pour on ev'ry Side:
In vain on Kinsman, or on Friend I call;
For universal Darkness hides them all.
| Poems on Several Occasions | |