University of Virginia Library

It might not be. To depths of lower shame
She sank all heedless. In her frenzied guilt,
Leaving the one true guardian of her life,
She sought another's home. With him she dwelt,
In guilty snatches of delirious joy,
Drowning in sin all memory of the past,
Bewitched by evil, till the flame burnt out,
As burn the thorns that sparkle on the hearth,
And left her cold and shivering in the gloom.
The adulterer's love, grown weary, turned to hate,
And bitter words made way for brutal deed;
And dragging her, once fondled and caressed,
As men may drag a slave they take in war,
Before the men who gather in the gate,
He offered her for money, less for greed
Of gold or silver, than in scorn and hate,
To grieve her woman's soul with foulest shame,
The lowest price demanding that men ask
For boy half-grown, or woman past her prime,
Half money, half in kind; and none would buy.
But I was there, and, weeping blinding tears,
I took her to myself, and paid the price
(Strange contrast to the dowry of her youth
When first I wooed her); and she came again
To dwell beneath my roof. Yet not for me
The tender hopes of those departed years
And not for her the freedom and the love
I then bestowed so freely. Sterner rule
Is needed now: in silence and alone,
In shame and sorrow, wailing, fast, and prayer,
She must blot out the stains that made her life
One long pollution. I, too, must abide
The issue of that penance, suffering long,
Her friend, yet not her husband, till the work
Be done, and all the wanton soul and sense
Be chastened into pureness. And as yet
The tears come not, but sullen, angry frown,
And fear that turns to hate, rejecting love,
And misery that crushes out the hope,
Each evil passion rushing through the soul,
And making life a hell. Ah me! my God!
Why was I born to taste this depth of woe?
Why closed not darkness o'er my infant life
On that accursèd day when joyful lips,
Unknowing of the future, raised the cry,
“Rejoice, O mother! Lo! a child is born”?