 | Three Hundred Sonnets |  |
197
POVERTY.
The sun is bright and glad, but not for me,My heart is dead to all but pain and sorrow,
Nor care nor hope have I in all I see,
Save from the fear that I may starve to-morrow;
And eagerly I seek uncertain toil,
Leaving my sinews in the thankless furrow,
To drain a scanty pittance from the soil,
While my life's lamp burns dim for lack of oil:
Alas, for you, poor famishing patient wife,
And pale-faced little ones! your feeble cries
Torture my soul: worse than a blank is life
Beggar'd of all that makes that life a prize:
Yet one thing cheers me,—is not life the door
To that Rich World where no one can be poor?
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