English Roses by F. Harald Williams [i.e. F. W. O. Ward] |
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| I. |
| II. |
| III. |
| IV. |
IN MOHAMMED'S COFFIN. |
| V. |
| VI. |
 | English Roses |  |
419
IN MOHAMMED'S COFFIN.
I had a frightful dream,
Yet sadly true;
I wandered through a world without a beam,
Without a clue,
And plagued by visions of malign derisions
Could nowhere find one saving rift of blue.
It was not darkness
But it seemed not light,
And yet I saw with dreadful sight
All horrors in their native starkness,
The seeds and sources of the hidden forces
Which glimmered as a dead man's face from night;
And I was swung, and carried off in
Mohammed's coffin.
Yet sadly true;
I wandered through a world without a beam,
Without a clue,
And plagued by visions of malign derisions
Could nowhere find one saving rift of blue.
It was not darkness
But it seemed not light,
And yet I saw with dreadful sight
All horrors in their native starkness,
The seeds and sources of the hidden forces
Which glimmered as a dead man's face from night;
And I was swung, and carried off in
Mohammed's coffin.
Betwixt the heaven and earth,
I grimly hung;
My soul was parched with an exceeding dearth,
My fingers clung
To air and nothing, as if matter's clothing
Had gone and left me scarcely even a tongue.
For empty spaces
Round me rolling spread
An awful blank I dimly read,
Who idly sought for friendly faces;
And desolation, sheer abomination,
Beneath me yawned and deepened overhead;
And sealed with silence, could I scoff in
Mohammed's coffin?
I grimly hung;
My soul was parched with an exceeding dearth,
My fingers clung
To air and nothing, as if matter's clothing
Had gone and left me scarcely even a tongue.
For empty spaces
Round me rolling spread
An awful blank I dimly read,
Who idly sought for friendly faces;
And desolation, sheer abomination,
Beneath me yawned and deepened overhead;
And sealed with silence, could I scoff in
Mohammed's coffin?
I laboured hard to speak,
But all in vain;
For the Great Void had made my spirit weak
With ghostly pain,
And its drear lightness bound me with a tightness
More searching than a ponderous prison chain.
I was not living,
Nor in any grave;
But still a creature worse than slave,
I only felt one vast misgiving;
And in the terror of the hopeless error,
Knew nowise what to question or to crave
Of doubtings, which I could not doff in
Mohammed's coffin.
But all in vain;
For the Great Void had made my spirit weak
With ghostly pain,
And its drear lightness bound me with a tightness
More searching than a ponderous prison chain.
I was not living,
Nor in any grave;
But still a creature worse than slave,
420
And in the terror of the hopeless error,
Knew nowise what to question or to crave
Of doubtings, which I could not doff in
Mohammed's coffin.
And then the shadow past
A breathing time,
And on the gaping gulf was sweetly cast
A moment's chime
From sunny borders, where celestial orders
Walked in glad garments at their work sublime.
But when the story
Of their perfect bliss,
Where all was good and nought amiss,
Touched me though hardly with its glory;
Then without pity from the radiant City,
They thrust me from them back to my Abyss;
And I was swung, and carried off in
Mohammed's coffin.
A breathing time,
And on the gaping gulf was sweetly cast
A moment's chime
From sunny borders, where celestial orders
Walked in glad garments at their work sublime.
But when the story
Of their perfect bliss,
Where all was good and nought amiss,
Touched me though hardly with its glory;
Then without pity from the radiant City,
They thrust me from them back to my Abyss;
And I was swung, and carried off in
Mohammed's coffin.
Again beneath the haze
Earth wavered up,
And sunrise smote me as my hungry gaze
Would eager sup
Once more on blessings old and soft caressings,
Which opened to me like a golden cup.
But ere a second
Of that grateful feast,
So precious to me in the least,
Which with familiar features beckon'd;
The pleasant table melted like a fable,
And grudged the very crumbs it gave the beast;
While I was poised, a vulgar scoff, in
Mohammed's coffin.
Earth wavered up,
And sunrise smote me as my hungry gaze
Would eager sup
Once more on blessings old and soft caressings,
Which opened to me like a golden cup.
But ere a second
Of that grateful feast,
So precious to me in the least,
Which with familiar features beckon'd;
The pleasant table melted like a fable,
And grudged the very crumbs it gave the beast;
While I was poised, a vulgar scoff, in
Mohammed's coffin.
The curse upon my life
Is heavy still,
And pampered doubt that saps my heart with strife
Besets my will;
And in suspended judgment never-ended,
Blown up and down I suffer every ill.
I have no Heaven,
For I cannot know
The certain glamour and the glow
Which is to others all their labours' leaven;
And earth denies me, and its joy defies me
To seize the rest which others reap below.
I wear a shroud, I cannot doff, in
Mohammed's coffin.
Is heavy still,
And pampered doubt that saps my heart with strife
Besets my will;
And in suspended judgment never-ended,
421
I have no Heaven,
For I cannot know
The certain glamour and the glow
Which is to others all their labours' leaven;
And earth denies me, and its joy defies me
To seize the rest which others reap below.
I wear a shroud, I cannot doff, in
Mohammed's coffin.
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