When the stunned soul can first lift tired eyes On her changed world of ruin, waste and wrack, Ah, what a pang of aching sharp surprise Brings all sweet memories of the lost past back, With wild self-pitying grief of one betrayed, Duped in a land of dreams where Truth is dead! Are these the heavens that she deemed were kind? Is this the world that yesterday was fair? What painted images of folk half-blind Be these who pass her by, as vague as air? What go they seeking? there is naught to find. Let them come nigh and hearken her despair. A mocking lie is all she once believed, And where her heart throbbed, is a cold dead stone. This is a doom she never preconceived, Yet now she cannot fancy it undone. Part of herself, part of the whole hard scheme, All else is but the shadow of a dream. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...EVENING IN A SUGAR ORCHARD by ROBERT FROST ON A LUTE FOUND IN A SARCOPHAGUS by EDMUND WILLIAM GOSSE THE AEOLIAN HARP; AT THE SURF INN by HERMAN MELVILLE WALT WHITMAN by FRANCIS HOWARD WILLIAMS CORYDON by LUCIUS MORRIS BEEBE AN ELEGY ON THE UNTIMELY DEATH OF THOMAS AYLEWORTH, SLAIN AT CROYDON by WILLIAM BROWNE (1591-1643) THE WANDERER: 5. IN HOLLAND: THE SHORE by EDWARD ROBERT BULWER-LYTTON |