 | The vision of Cortes, Cain, and other poems |  |
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STANZAS.
I.
Cold, in its solitary cell,My heart reposes, lapt in tears;
Or, rises, for awhile, to tell
How slow, the chain of being, wears;
Impatient of the long delay,
And fill'd with deep and restless thirst,
Why does it linger thus away,
Nor spurn the chain at once, and burst.
Thus frozen in its onward course,
And chill'd with early, fatal blight,
Even love's own power, hath lost its force,
And beauty, were a shade to sight.
II.
To be, is not a pain so deep,But being thus!—and not to be,
Comes on me, with a snail-like creep,
That must not else be taught by me!
Ah would it were, that we could urge
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As barks, upon the restless surge,
Driven, with a tide, unmatched, and strong.
Oh, not for me, the crime in thought—
Yet 'twere a boon I may not fear—
'Twere sure, that howsoe'er unsought,
Death were not shrunk from, were he near!
| The vision of Cortes, Cain, and other poems | |