Life and Phantasy :: :: University of Virginia Library

“A fire keeps burning in this breast.
The smoke ascending to my brain
Sometimes stupefies the pain.
Sometimes my senses drop, no doubt.
I do not always feel the pain:
But my head is a weary, weary load.

What place is this?—I sit at rest,
With grass and bushes round about;
No dust, no noise, no endless road,
No torturing light. Stay, let me think,
Is this the place where I knelt to drink,
And all my hair broke loose and fell,
And floated in the cold, clear well
Hung with rock-weeds? two children came
With pitchers, but they scream'd and ran;
The woman stared, the cursèd man
Laugh'd—no, no, this is not the same.
I now remember. Dragging through
The thorny fence has torn my gown.
These boots are very nearly done.
What matter? so's my journey, too.

Nearly done . . . A quiet spot!
Flowers touch my hand. It's summer now.
What summer meant I had forgot;
Except that it was glaring hot
Through tedious days, and heavy hot
Through dreadful nights.

The drooping bough
Is elm; its shadow lies below.
Gathering flowers we used to creep
Along the hedgerows, where the sun
Came through like this; then, everyone,
Find out some arbour close and cool,

To weave them in our rushy caps,
Primroses, bluebells, such a heap,
Stay, now!—the girls are hid perhaps—
It may be all a dream—

You fool!
Was it for this you tramp'd your way
And begg'd your way by night and day
To find this place? . . . It's his domain:
Each tree is his, each blade of grass
Under my feet. How dare I pass,
A tatter'd vagrant, half insane,
Scarce fit to slink by the roadside,
These lordly bounds, where, with his Bride—
I tell you, kneeling on this sod,
He is, before the face of God,
My husband!

I was innocent
The day I first set eyes on him,
Eyes that no tears had yet made dim,
Nor fever wild. The day he went,
(That day, O God of Heaven!) I found,
In the sick brain slow turning round,
Dreadful forebodings of my fate.
A week was not so long to wait:
Another pass'd,—and then a third.
My face grew thin—eyes fix'd—I heard
And started if a feather stirr'd.
Each night ‘to-morrow!’ heard me say,
Each morning ‘he will come to-day.’
Who taps upon the chamber door?
A letter—he will come no more.
Then stupor. Then a horrid strife
Trampling my brain and soul and life,—
Hunting me out as with a knife
From home—from home—

And I was young,
And happy. May his heart be wrung

As mine is! learn that even I
Was something, and at least can die
Of such a wound. In any case
He'll see the death that's in my face.
To die is still within the power
Of girls with neither rank nor dower.

This his place, and I am here.
The house lay that side as one came.
How sick and deadly tired I am!
Time has been lost: O this new fear,
That I may fall and never rise!
Clouds come and go within my eyes.
I'm hot and cold, my limbs all slack,
My swollen feet the same as dead;
A weight like lead draws down my head,
The boughs and brambles pull me back.
Stay: the wood opens to the hill.
A moment now. The house is near.
But one may view it closer still
From these thick laurels on the right,
. . . What is this? Who come in sight?
He, with his Bride. It sends new might
Through all my feeble body. Hush!
Which way? which way? which way? that bush
Hides them—they're coming—do they pause?
He points, almost to me!—he draws
Her tow'rds him, and I know the smile
That's on his face—O heart of guile!
No, 'twas the selfish gaiety
And arrogance of wealth. I see
Your Bride is tall, and graceful too.
That arch of leaves invites you through.
I follow. Why should I be loth
To hurt her? . . . Ha! I'll find them both.
Six words suffice to make her know.
Both, both shall hear—it must be so!”