Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE LOST SPIRIT, by MARIA JANE JEWSBURY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE LOST SPIRIT, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Weep, sire, with shame and ruin
Last Line: I dreamed -- and woke in hell!
Alternate Author Name(s): Fletcher, Maria Jane Jewsbury


Weep, Sire, with shame and ruin,
Weep for thy child's undoing!
For the days when I was young,
And no prayer was taught my tongue;
Nor the record from on high,
Of the life that cannot die:
Wiles of the world and men --
Of their threescore years and ten;
Earthly profit -- human praise,
Thou didst set before my gaze,
As the guiding stars of life,
As the meed of toil and strife;
I ran the world's race well,
And find my guerdon -- HELL!

Weep, Mother, weep -- yet know
'T will not shorten endless wo,
Nor thy prayer unbind my chain,
Thy repentance soften pain,
Nor the life-blood of thy frame,
For one moment quench this flame!
Weep not beside my tomb,
That is gentle, painless gloom;
Let the worm and darkness prey
On my senseless slumbering clay;
Weep for the priceless gem
That may not hide with them;
Weep the lost spirit's fate,
Yet know thy tears too late: --
Had they sooner fallen -- well,
I had not wept in HELL!

Physician, canst thou weep?
Then let tears thy pillow steep:
Couldst thou view Time's nearing wave,
Doomed to whelm me in its grave;
The last and lessening space,
My life's brief hour of grace,
Yet with gay, unfaltering tongue,
Promise health and sojourn long?
On the brink of that profound
Without measure, depth, or bound,
View me busied with the toys
Of a world of shadowy joys?
Oh, had look, or sign, or breath,
Then whispered aught of death;
Though nature in the strife,
Had loosed her hold on life,
And the worm received its prey
Perchance an earlier day --
This -- this -- and who can tell
That I had dwelt in HELL!

False Prophet, faltering Priest,
Full fraught with mirth and feast!
Thy weeping should not fail
But with life's dark-ended tale!
For the living -- for the dead --
There is guilt upon thy head!
Thou didst make the "narrow way,"
As the broad one, smooth and gay;
So speak in accents bland
Of the bright and better land,
That the soul unchanged within,
The sinner in his sin,
Of God and Christ unshriven,
Lay down with dreams of heaven!
False Priest, thy labours tell,
I dreamed -- and woke in HELL!





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