| Alfred H. Miles, ed. Women Poets of the Nineteenth Century. 1907. | | | Sonnets.
II. Nirvana | | By Mathilde Blind (1841–1896) |
| | | DIVEST thyself, O Soul, of vain desire! | |
| Bid hope farewell, dismiss all coward fears; | |
| Take leave of empty laughter, emptier tears, | |
| And quench, for ever quench, the wasting fire | |
| Wherein this heart, as in a funeral pyre, | 5 |
| Aye burns, yet is consumed not. Years on years, | |
| Moaning with memories in thy maddened ears— | |
| Let at thy word, like refluent waves, retire. | |
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| Enter thy soul’s vast realm as Sovereign Lord, | |
| And like that angel with the flaming sword, | 10 |
| Wave off life’s clinging hands. Then chains will fall | |
| From the poor slave of self’s hard tyranny— | |
| And Thou, a ripple rounded by the sea, | |
| In rapture lost be lapped within the All. | | | | |
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