Christ's Company and Other Poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

I find myself by a black spring and cold,
Which slowly bursts from this rock's heavy head,
Like drops of sweat wrung from our God of old,
And plashes dead
Into a basin hollowed from the mould.

I trace this fountain rolling deeply down—
Dark is the night, my pathway ruinous—
Here foam the muddy billows thick and brown,
Then issue thus
Into a lake where all the world might drown.

I mark the mountains stand about and brood—
The lake and they together, God, remain,
As black and deep and steep as walls of mud
On some vast plain
Block out and brood upon a swimming drain.

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I mark a woman on the farther shore
Walk ghost-like; her I shriek to with my might;
Ghostlike she walketh ever more and more;
Her face how white!
How small between us seems the Infinite!

I call her, but she ever tacks and veers
Like some wan sail that sails in the salt seas
Unheeding all the shore's strained eyes and ears;
Must this not cease?
Ah! hear my cry, dear soul, and give me peace.

I call her; never may she heed or note:
Is this the end? Just Judge, this place is cursed!
Each breath I draw within my beating throat
Doth make and burst
Bubbles of blood. Death, death! Death last and first.