©Biblioteca Nacional de Colombia

NIGHT 79
We seize what this world gives of good, and deem
Ail Better a deception and a dream.
High feelings, that in us to life gave birth,
Are numbed and wither in the coil of earth.
How boldly, in the days of youthful Hope,
I magination spreads her wings uncheckcd,
Deeming all things within her ample scope,
To the ETERNAL! and how small a. apace
Suffices her when Fortune flees apace,
And all we loved in life's strange whirl is wrecked!
Deep in the breast Care builds her nest,
Rocks restlessly and scares away all rest.
Some secret sorrow still the envious one
Keeps stirring at till peace and joy are gone.
Each day she masks her in some new disguise,
Each day with some new trick the temper trics,
Is House and Homestead, Child and Wife,
Fire, Water, Poison, Dagger-knife.
Evils that never come disquiet thee,
Evermore mourning losses not to be!
I am not like the gods. No! no! I tremble;
Feeling impressed upon my mind the thought,
Of the mean worm whose nature I resemble.
'Tis dust, and lives in dust, and the chance tread
Crushes the wretched reptile into nought.
Is this not dust in which I live?
This prison-place, what can it give
Of life or comfort? wheresoe'er
The sick eye turns, it sees one tier­
.Along the blank high wall-of shelves
And gloomy volumes, which themselves
Are dust and lumber; and the scrolls
That crowd the hundred pigeon-holes
And crevices of that old case-
That darkens and confines the space
.Already but too small-'mong these
What can life be but a disease?
©Biblioteca Nacional de Colombia