 | A Collection of Original Poems |  |
189
LAST NIGHT THOUGHTS.
A Fragment in Imitation of Dr. Young.
By ------
O night! dark night! wrapt up in Stygian gloom,
Thy riding hood opake; wove by the hands
Of Clotho and of Atropos, those hands
That spin my thread of life—how near its end!
Oh! wherefore, silent Goddess, wouldst thou thus
Awake my terrors! silence sounds alarms
To me; and darkness dazzles my weak mind.
Hark! 'tis the death watch—posts themselves can speak
Death's language: stop, oh stop—insatiate worm!
I feel thy summons—to my fellow worms
Thou bid'st me hasten. I attend thy call.
And wherefore should I live.—Vain life to me
Is but a tatter'd garment, a patch'd rag,
That ill defends me from the cold of age:
Cramp'd are my faculties; my eyes are dim;
No music charms my ear; nor meats my taste;
The females fly me, and my very wife,
Poor woman, knows me not.
Thy riding hood opake; wove by the hands
Of Clotho and of Atropos, those hands
That spin my thread of life—how near its end!
Oh! wherefore, silent Goddess, wouldst thou thus
Awake my terrors! silence sounds alarms
To me; and darkness dazzles my weak mind.
Hark! 'tis the death watch—posts themselves can speak
Death's language: stop, oh stop—insatiate worm!
I feel thy summons—to my fellow worms
Thou bid'st me hasten. I attend thy call.
And wherefore should I live.—Vain life to me
Is but a tatter'd garment, a patch'd rag,
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Cramp'd are my faculties; my eyes are dim;
No music charms my ear; nor meats my taste;
The females fly me, and my very wife,
Poor woman, knows me not.
Ye flutt'ring, idle vanities of life;
Where are ye flown? the birds that ask'd to sing,
Amid my spreading branches, now forsake
This lifeless trunk, and find no shelter there.
What's life! what's death?—thus coveted and fear'd?
Life is a fleeting shadow—death's no more,—
Death's a dark lanthorn,—life's a candle's end,
Stuck on a saveall, soon to end in stench:—
Foh! death's a privy—life the alley green,
Which leads to't, where, perchance, on either side
A sweet-briar hedge, or shrub of broader leaf,
And more commodious, breathe their treach'rous sweets!
Death follows life; and stops it e'er it reach
The topmost spoke of fortune's envied wheel.
Wheel!—life's a wheel—and each man is the ass
That turns it, oft receiving in the end
But water and rank thistle for his pains.
Where are ye flown? the birds that ask'd to sing,
Amid my spreading branches, now forsake
This lifeless trunk, and find no shelter there.
What's life! what's death?—thus coveted and fear'd?
Life is a fleeting shadow—death's no more,—
Death's a dark lanthorn,—life's a candle's end,
Stuck on a saveall, soon to end in stench:—
Foh! death's a privy—life the alley green,
Which leads to't, where, perchance, on either side
A sweet-briar hedge, or shrub of broader leaf,
And more commodious, breathe their treach'rous sweets!
Death follows life; and stops it e'er it reach
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Wheel!—life's a wheel—and each man is the ass
That turns it, oft receiving in the end
But water and rank thistle for his pains.
And yet, Lorenzo, if consider'd right,
A life of labour, is a life of ease;
Pain is true joy; and want is luxury.
A life of labour, is a life of ease;
Pain is true joy; and want is luxury.
Vain mirth's an opera-tune, a tortur'd sigh;
Groans modulated by the tyrant's ball—
The breath of eunuchs,—it dismembers bliss—
Makes man not man, and castrates real joy.
Groans modulated by the tyrant's ball—
The breath of eunuchs,—it dismembers bliss—
Makes man not man, and castrates real joy.
Would ye be merry? seek some Charnel-house'
Where death inhabits,—give a ball to death—
A doomsday ball—and lead up Holben's dance.
How weak, how strong, how gentle, how severe!
Are laughter's chains that gall a willing world:
The noisy ideot shakes her bells at all,
Not ev'n the Bible, or the Night-thoughts 'scape;
Fools spare not heav'n itself, O Young, nor Thee.
Where death inhabits,—give a ball to death—
A doomsday ball—and lead up Holben's dance.
How weak, how strong, how gentle, how severe!
Are laughter's chains that gall a willing world:
The noisy ideot shakes her bells at all,
Not ev'n the Bible, or the Night-thoughts 'scape;
Fools spare not heav'n itself, O Young, nor Thee.
| A Collection of Original Poems | |