bbornly dumb,
Stilling what words I would say,
While I flung my heart's treasure away,
While I tampered with fire--to my cost;
Till I knew the ultimate end had come--
I had matched pride with love--and lost!

IX.

What poisoned pen has written
The words that bar my breath;
What hard, harsh hand has smitten
My soul with death?

"_Love, my love_"--these the words I read--
"_The vision and dream of a life have died.
Hurt to the heart by the words you said,_
Angered, stung by a wounded pride,
Mad with the thought that your love was dead--
I have wedded a loveless, unloved bride--
Would I had died instead!_"

My heart refuses to understand
The words that burn my brain;
Palsied, stunned by a felling blow
Struck by a cherished hand,
I am all too numb for pain;
Dead to a deathless woe,
Helpless to understand,
Shall I ever feel again?

X.

Awake, alive to pain! The first steel gleam of morn
Stabs deep the heart I thought had shrunk to dust,
The love I prayed might die to loveless scorn
Awakes and cries ... Ah, God, how is it just
A fault so slight such meed of pain should pay,
That one mad word in pride and anger spoken
Should leave two lives forever crushed and broken,
Should plait a scourge to lash my soul for aye?

How can a just God see men suffer thus?--
Unheedful of the cosmic cry of pain,
Unmoved by all the pangs that torture us,
Knowing our prayers and tears alike are vain--
Like to a wanton boy who feels no thrill
Of pity for the weak his strength holds thrall,
Who pins a helpless butterfly against a wall,
Watching the bright wings flutter and grow still.

We are the sport of some malignant Power
Who nails us to our crosses, hard and fast,
Who sees us flutter for a little hour,
Struggle and suffer ... and grow still at last;
Who hears untouched the ceaseless, cosmic groan
Wrung from his creatures' tortured lips alway;
He will not hear or heed! What need to pray?
There is no hand to help. We stand alone.

* * * * *

Father, forgive! I know not what I say,
Frenzied, tortured, torn on the rack of pain;
Teach these pain-writhen lips once more to pray--
Help me to trust again!

XI.

A year! How slight a space
When winged with ecstasy!
(An aeon dark to me.)
He has brought her home--God lend me grace!
To-night in the throng I shall see his face--
He has long forgotten me.
A year