 | Poems |  |
215
REMORSE.
A FRAGMENT.
The fierce demands the self-attacking breast
Makes for the motives it but now possest—
Pressing for reasons it can ne'er accord,
Reasons for conduct now contemned, abhorred:—
The bitter curses on its weakness cast,
Deep imprecations on its frenzy past—
When waking to a consciousness of crime
From passion which obscured it for a time,
It views the work on which its rage was spent
With gloomy horror—blank astonishment!—
Makes for the motives it but now possest—
Pressing for reasons it can ne'er accord,
Reasons for conduct now contemned, abhorred:—
The bitter curses on its weakness cast,
Deep imprecations on its frenzy past—
When waking to a consciousness of crime
From passion which obscured it for a time,
It views the work on which its rage was spent
With gloomy horror—blank astonishment!—
The torturing Thought that all Remorse is vain,
That nothing can undo that deed again—
Prayers, curses, tears, can move it not, nor wound—
Those soul-shot arrows on the soul rebound—
There, sternly fixed, irrevocably done,
Accuser, judge, avenger, all in one,—
Its maddening muteness mocks the wretch who gave
It birth—its palled Creator now its Slave!—
That nothing can undo that deed again—
Prayers, curses, tears, can move it not, nor wound—
Those soul-shot arrows on the soul rebound—
There, sternly fixed, irrevocably done,
Accuser, judge, avenger, all in one,—
Its maddening muteness mocks the wretch who gave
It birth—its palled Creator now its Slave!—
216
The furious efforts of the Soul to flee
From that o'erwhelming, withering Certainty,—
Her wildest plungings in the tangling toils,
But make more keenly felt the clinging coils,
The deepening dints of that still, clankless chain,
That circling mute Omnipotence of Pain!—
From that o'erwhelming, withering Certainty,—
Her wildest plungings in the tangling toils,
But make more keenly felt the clinging coils,
The deepening dints of that still, clankless chain,
That circling mute Omnipotence of Pain!—
And silently, as some increasing Tide
Swells on the barrier which confronts its pride,
That Thought unfolds the fullness of its might
And brings its still Resistlessness to light!
Then, as some Monster of his prey secure,
Despising haste where victory is sure,
Sports him with pangs which faint and fainter grow,
Watching his victim's death—though certain, slow;—
So that Reflection sees the Spirit cower,
Beneath its crushing weight of passive power—
Distracted with vain struggles to get free,
And maddening with excess of Misery—
Exhausting self in fruitless self-defence,
And writhing in convulsive impotence!
Swells on the barrier which confronts its pride,
That Thought unfolds the fullness of its might
And brings its still Resistlessness to light!
Then, as some Monster of his prey secure,
Despising haste where victory is sure,
Sports him with pangs which faint and fainter grow,
Watching his victim's death—though certain, slow;—
So that Reflection sees the Spirit cower,
Beneath its crushing weight of passive power—
Distracted with vain struggles to get free,
And maddening with excess of Misery—
Exhausting self in fruitless self-defence,
And writhing in convulsive impotence!
The Mind resigned to Reason all too late,
Itself the only object of its hate,
In vain reproaches on reproaches urge—
Itself the victim, and itself the scourge!
Waging on agonising War with Air
It whirls within the Maelstrom of Despair!
Itself the only object of its hate,
In vain reproaches on reproaches urge—
Itself the victim, and itself the scourge!
Waging on agonising War with Air
It whirls within the Maelstrom of Despair!
December 25th, 1832.
| Poems | |