 | Poems descriptive, dramatic, legendary and contemplative |  |
SONNET.—REPROACH AND CONSOLATION.
Well said the master,—“The worst grief of all,Is to remember, in our hours of woe,
How blest we have been!” It were rightly so,
If, like Adam's memory of his wretched fall,
To the keen thought of pleasures ever gone,
There be the sting of self-reproach, to say,
“The seed is of thy planting—go thy way,
And let the curse be on thy head alone!”
This is the bitterer truth,—but it is one,
In bitterness thrice blessed, if it brings
Repentance, that, with healing on its wings,
Will cheer the future, and the past atone:
It were a grace to pray for, night and day,
In ashes,—while the world is out at play.
| Poems descriptive, dramatic, legendary and contemplative | |