Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE LAST DREAM, by GEORGE MURRAY (1830-1910)


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE LAST DREAM, by                    
First Line: In a dismal room in a city garret high
Last Line: What misery when death becomes a hope!
Subject(s): Immortality; Night; Silence; Sleep; Soul; Bedtime


In a dismal room in a city garret high,
Where a lamp, low burning, casts a feeble ray,
Death-sick of fever a suffering child doth lie,
And a woman, watching, weeps the night away.

Sadly she weeps, low bending o'er the form
Whose little lamp of life must soon grow dark—
That life her love had watched through sun and storm,
Her sorrow now beholds whose dimming spark.

By day, by night, for many a weary week,
Had she thus fostered that beloved life;
But now, to-night, her heart doth well nigh break
To see that that dear life, now left, is brief.

For 'tis not only fever on that brow,
Nor fever's fires that fill those soft sunk eyes;
Nay, the blush that spreads, the fire that glows there now,
Doth from a different, deeper source arise.

'Tis death's first, gently-faint, approaching touch—
For death hath sweet as well as awful guise:
Often it cometh with a softness such
As scarce to show when forth the freed soul flies;

But rare, as now with this young innocent,
It comes with brightness, not with shadows dark,
A bloom like health's to once pale cheeks is lent,
From sunken eyes seems beaming life's bright spark.

But why look those bright orbs so fixedly,
As if brick walls no longer bound their sight?
Why clasp those little hands so rigidly?
Those parched lips why break in smiles so bright?

'Tis the immortal soul, already fluttering free—
Still bound to earth, yet beating heaven's air—
That gifts that sight most wondrous things to see,
Those listening ears far whisperings to hear.

Bright must those visions be, and sweet those sounds,
For wakened memories o'er those features fleet;
And list! that voice rises o'er pain's strait bounds,
A fervid, wild, breaks yet ecstatic sweet:

"Hark, mother! I hear the rushing brook;
'Tis the same sweet sound of long ago;
I hear it singing beneath the rock,
And laughing where the shallows flow."

" 'Tis only the falling rain on the roof, my child,
Hush! softer speak, thy fancy runneth wild."

"Nay, mother, no fancy deceiveth me,
For I see the water shining now;
And look! on the bank is the tulip tree,
With the swing still hanging from the bough!"

"Nay, 'tis but the towering factory stack
Thy fevered brain doth paint a budding tree;
Its flame, from yon high window'd walls shot back,
Is the gleaming water that ye think ye see."

"Oh, look! there's father and little Ned
Standing on the green bank there
Where the brook in a circling pool doth spread,
O'erhung by dainty maiden-hair.

"And see, they have my little boat,
My pretty boat that father made;
They've set it in the pool to float,
And spread its sail beneath the shade.

"Oh hasten, hurry, mother kind!
We'll join and play with them a while—
Why do ye hang so slow behind?
Why weep ye when they happy smile?

"Come! we'll play all afternoon,
And then we will together all
Find out the moss-grown table-stone
That rests beside the water-fall.

"And there we will our supper lay,
When the setting sun shall slant along,
And father will tell a story gay,
And you shall sing a pretty song;
We'll have a long, glad holiday
Till the stars begin to throng—

"But, mother! Oh, they leave the pool!
Why, why do they haste so soon away?
Why wait they not 'neath the alders cool?
Oh, why will they not our coming stay?

"See how they beckon us draw near,
Yet still do ever further flee—
Alas! how swift they disappear!
How dim, how faint their shadows be!

"And now the brook seems running dry,
I cannot hear it laugh or sing,
Its bank-side ferns and blossoms die;
I cannot see the tulip-swing.

"The very rocks do melt away;
The trees seem withering where they stand;
The sun grows dark! Kind mother pray
Come closer, closer hold mine hand.

"But hark! what wondrous sound I hear?
A music rapturous, divine,
Like voices softly singing near,
A thousand voices sweet as thine!

"Tell me, whence comes this melody,
That stills, that drives away my pain?
Ah! happy, happy would I be,
If ever thus I might remain!"

" 'Tis only the bells that chime the hour of morn
When labor's weary children wake from sleep—
But oh! how gladly would my toil be borne,
If I that smile on thy dear face could keep!"

"And what is this light that fills mine eyes,
So soft, so radiant, so fair;
That seems from no place to arise,
Yet falleth softly everywhere?"

" 'Tis only the light in the East, my child, of the morning,
The light we both have seen so oft before—
Alas, alas, another day's bright dawning,
I fear together we shall see no more!"

"Hush, mother! The voices are dying now,
And a sweet, sweet peace doth o'er me creep,
And I feel a soft breath on my brow;
Hush, for I fain would fall asleep."

Alas! no need those trembling lips to hush,
No need to beg that sobbing voice be still;
The grief that, falling, all but life doth crush,
On both had set its silent, silent seal.

Full well she knew he felt the eternal morn;
That from his sleep he would no waking know;
The last loved heart that loved her now was gone;
That she from thence alone through life must go.

Oh saddest thought! No more that attic room,
Which scarce the sun for one brief hour could fill,
For her with those bright flowers of joy would bloom,
Which spring from a child's caress and loving smile.

Her future now but hopeless toil could show,
No life to cherish but her bleeding own.
Ah, is there a state more sad, more full of woe,
Than this: to labor for one's life alone?

Thrice blest the hearts, when pierced by sorrow's sting,
Which, in their anguish, may find sweet relief
By opening pity's gates on lives that cling
Fainting to them, crushed 'neath the common grief.

But when grief's poison entereth the heart
Whose safety-valves of love may never ope,
There's naught but death can e'er relief impart,—
What misery when death becomes a hope!




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