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| THERE goes a wandering soul in desert places; | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
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| About its way, lie dumb, with livid faces, | |
| Slain virtues and slain hopes in locked embraces; | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | 5 |
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| And drear black crags tower from unholy ground | |
| Sheer upward in thick air, | |
| Where breathes no prayer; | |
| No wind is there, | |
| No sound; | 10 |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
| |
| And there is no way out, and round and round, | |
| With haggard eye and dragged and staggering paces, | |
| Through years that soul a ghastly circuit traces. | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | 15 |
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| The sun, all shorn of rays, with lurid fire | |
| Blasts where it strikes: Doom’s own red eye of ire: | |
| And all night long is seen unhallowed shimmer,— | |
| Half life, half mire,— | |
| Of things made manifest that should be hid; | 20 |
| Yet Will is numb that should their play forbid; | |
| And so they crowd and crawl in gloom and glimmer, | |
| Loathed and unchid; | |
| And lo! that soul among them, moving dimmer. | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | 25 |
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| At the soul’s back behold a burden yonder, | |
| A monstrous thing of slime; | |
| Two paces forth,—no more,—that Doomed may wander | |
| For all its time;— | |
| Two wretched paces from the accursed weight | 30 |
| Bound on by linkèd fate | |
| In glittering cynic chain two steps behind it; | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
| |
| Such steely bond between | |
| Forbids it breath, save only to remind it | 35 |
| The Past has been, | |
| The Past of sin. | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
| |
| Ay! just where life is holiest—at the source | |
| Of the soft, ruffled wings,—is chained the curse. | 40 |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
| |
| Those pinions, once all light and wide of feather | |
| That soared right loftily, see, clamped together; | |
| And quivering life is gallèd at the spot, | |
| Sore hurt and hot: | 45 |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
| |
| Yet, chafes that soul rebellious at the tether? | |
| Or, in vain swiftness seeks to flee the load? | |
| Then heavier fall the blood-drops on the road:— | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | 50 |
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| The loathèd burden of unburied death | |
| Flies fast as flies that Doomed, or drags as slow; | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
| |
| Two paces forward ever may it go; | |
| No more; the burden grimly followeth. | 55 |
| There is no freedom here, | |
| Nor any cheer! | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
| |
| Not lightened yet to skeleton, nor dried, | |
| The load yields horror, horror yet beside; | 60 |
| Fell fumes, halt poison and half sustenance, | |
| That hinder life, and hinder deathly trance. | |
| Is there a chance? | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) * * * * * | |
| Three virgin forms came passing by but lately, | 65 |
| Treading the desert boldly and sedately, | |
| Calling it ‘beauteous earth,’ | |
| Who met this Doomed, and gazed upon it straightly; | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
| |
| These saw no burden, so they praised the chain; | 70 |
| Its treacherous glitter seemed some bauble worn | |
| About the wingèd shoulders to adorn. | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
| |
| They noted on the path no shocking stain, | |
| So, as the soul made moan, | 75 |
| Knowing no whit of conflict nor of pain, | |
| Deemed it most vain, | |
| And answered in gay tone— | |
| “Now Heaven deliver thee, | |
| Spirit alone!— | 80 |
| Why grievest thou when every bird is singing, | |
| And glad white cloudlets high in ether winging | |
| Brighten e’en sunshine? Hear the steeples ringing | |
| With marriage mirth! | |
| Behold life blest with love and holiday | 85 |
| While thou art stricken, bent, and wan to see; | |
| Good Lord, deliver thee!” | |
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| All mutely points that soul beyond the chain | |
| Two paces backward; points in vain, in vain;— | |
| Who sees not, cannot aid. | 90 |
| Oh, kind, unkindly virgin sympathy! | |
| Oh, blind, hell-deepening, heavenly mockery! | |
| What though each maid | |
| Had pitied had she seen; not one could see, | |
| Not one of three. | 95 |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
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| They passed, and music with them. Then there came | |
| Three little children, joying e’en the same, | |
| Yet sweetlier still. They called the desert “May.” | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | 100 |
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| “Come play with us at play; | |
| Blue skies and meadows green are friends to-day; | |
| Spread thy good wings, that we may mount thereon | |
| And seek of all the clouds the whitest one | |
| To tiptoe on its top toward the sun; | 105 |
| And prove whose sight is strongest! | |
| And who can gaze the longest! | |
| Our little eyes are clear,— | |
| Young, but so clear! | |
| In each of thine there trembles half a tear! | 110 |
| Ah! fun!— | |
| We see where thou canst see not; in the eye | |
| Of the great golden sun that crowns the sky!” | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
| |
| A mother and a father wandered by: | 115 |
| Hand locked in hand.—“This way the children went,” | |
| Quoth he, “on some enchanting mischief bent; | |
| Behold, their little footprints thickly lie.” | |
| “Bless them!” quoth she: then closer to his side | |
| Drew shudderingly: “An influence is here, | 120 |
| Here in the air; the sunlight seemeth drear; | |
| Oh, lead me hence!” and he: | |
| “’Tis so; I see a form unmeet to see | |
| Advancing painfully. | |
| Oh, fear! | 125 |
| Lest the sweet babies lingered near the spot, | |
| For something foul doth surely somewhere rot; | |
| It boots not to know what. | |
| Hence! spirit dear.” | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) * * * * * | 130 |
| Maiden and babe and mother have passed by | |
| Scatheless, yet left the doom-glare red and high | |
| Above the blackened valley of all dole, | |
| Nor freed the laden soul. | |
| Crawl, ye foul formless ills! about your prey; | 135 |
| Sink, O thrice lost! forsaken on the way; | |
| Perish from day! | |
| Since thrice hath passed in vain the innocent, | |
| And hope is long, long spent, | |
| And will is rent. | 140 |
| (Good Lord! Great God! deliver! deliver!) | |
| |
| Lo! Love comes wandering on the desert way. | |
| Oh, watch! oh, pray! | |
| Love with the rose-wreath red? | |
| Ay, love rose-bound! | 145 |
| Ay, love thorn-crowned! | |
| Crowned—bound—with cruel rose-thorns round his head! | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
| |
| Love! love is here! that knoweth of all pain, | |
| And of the linkèd chain, | 150 |
| And of the stain, | |
| And of the whirling madness, dumb and dread; | |
| Love! love is here that knoweth nought in vain! | |
| Dead hope, dead will, oh! cry | |
| Aloud! Love passeth by; | 155 |
| Love, that can love dead life to live again! | |
| (Good Lord, deliver!) | |
| |
| New radiance hallows all the sickened air; | |
| For love is here. | |
| And right and left spring lilies at his nod, | 160 |
| Blessing the blighted sod, | |
| For love is here. | |
| And round the gaunt crags echo of deep prayer | |
| Is sighing everywhere,— | |
| Is sighing everywhere! | 165 |
| For love is here. | |
| (Deliver! Lord, deliver!) | |
| |
| Kneels that worn soul, for all the place is holy; | |
| Breaks that sore heart, in utterance lost and lowly; | |
| “For Love’s dear sake, great Powers, deliver me! | 170 |
| O Love, deliver me!” * * * * * | |
| A little bird sweet twitters in a tree; | |
| A little breeze comes coolly from the sea; | |
| And broad the dawn-light widens o’er the lea. | |
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