The Poetical Works of the Rev. George Croly :: :: University of Virginia Library

Fair Angoulême! in what empurpled bower
Pass'd thy young innocence the sunny hour?—
Her sun was dim. The prison was the clime
That struck upon the royal infant's prime.
Her joys, to watch the sentinel's dull round,
Till her ear sicken'd at the weary sound;
To count, yet care not for the hour's slow wheel,
As one on whom the grave had set its seal;
To pine upon her pillow for the day,
Yet, seen, to wish its cheerless beam away;
Then, tremble as drew on the tedious night,
And feel as life were parting with the light;—
Then—to her couch, to weep and watch for morn,
To shew her she was living—and forlorn!

She had companions. Deeper misery!
All whom she loved on earth were there—to die!
And they must perish from her—one by one—
And her soul bleed with each, till all were gone.

This is the woe of woes, the sting of fate,
To see our little world grow desolate,
The few on whom the very soul reclined
Sink from the eye, and feel we stay behind;—
Life, to the farthest glance, a desert road,
Dark, fearful, weary—yet that must be trod.

Daughter of France! did not such pangs compress
Thy heart in its last, utter loneliness?
Didst thou not droop thy head upon thy hand,
Then, starting, think that time was at a stand,
And find its flight but by the thicker gloom
That dimm'd thy solitary dungeon room?
Didst thou not gaze upon thy glimpse of sky,
And long to bid the last, best hour be nigh?
Or melted even by that moment's view,
Stoop to the world again, and think, how blue,
How bright to thousands spread its canopy;
How many a joyous heart and laughing eye,
Buoyant with life and hope, and free,—oh, free!—
Bask'd in the brightness thou shouldst never see?

Her world was past; her hours, or few or more,
Left her bound, wretched—all she was before!
This, this is misery—the headsman's steel
Strikes, and we perish—but we cease to feel.