ALONE

The mocking fiends by day Make frenzied play Around my loneliness; The haunting sprites delight To sport at night, And jeer at my soul’s wretchedness; Imprisoned in the boundary of a mind Holding but one thought; only one can find The thought of you! You, far away, In silence wrapped. With all Hell’s crew About me gay, And I in loneliness am trapped. Not God nor Devil ease The torture of a lonely soul, For haunting thoughts will cling, And naught relief can bring— No recreation please. Grim misery must take its toll Of tears and pain— And work is vain! The vanquished mind in scorn Sneers on its child; His work, and damns it be forlorn, And with it all creative work Henceforward be reviled. Work? Where? Not here! Within these walls? Work! What? Come, try it now, And answer every thought that calls In every moment. Tell me how One single minute, pray, My mind can get away From her, the absent one— Come, tell me, and my work is done. The air! Go out and roam the field. Sit in the sun—or rain; Or count the stars again; Or tell the steps long footsore journeys have revealed. Do something. Go! But what? What, leave that thought behind? Where go? Where that is not The burden of my mind? Forget. Why, all the fiends of midnight hours Yell that drab word at me; it falls in showers Of rattling drops, And never stops, Until my ears Nigh burst, And I accurst With all Hell’s fears! Still there are moments when Relief comes to my ken, Then I admire my torturer sublime. The silence of her absence is like time A million years beyond this day— Like stillness of forgotten tombs, Where Nineveh, once gay, Stood mighty, where now the sandstorm booms O’er a desert quite as lonely as my heart. She leaves me, like a queen, to bear the smart Of her superb indifference and calm— Unconscious of the harm Such loneliness can do! The day when it is new Dawns dark and drear. Each hour a bier On which I lay my thought, And see it come to life again— Reincarnated spirit, caught Back, to murder it in agony, and then— The weary strife goes on and on, The minutes reek with blood, And then the fiends of loneliness soon don The inky cloak with scarlet hood, And round me chant their racking dirges chill, And bring their terrors on to slay my will. First, slimy, drooling Jealousy appears— A female draped in timid lover’s fears— She minces, ambles, leers at me, And whispers tales, maliciously. The spume of Hell’s presumption she, The horror of the lonely. See! How she begins her work— The craft! the skill! It enters like a dirk— The soul to kill. She fails, and vanishes in mist. My soul is adamant, and will resist. Then Poison comes, in silvery sheen, The figure holds a cup between The palms of outstretched hands, And in a pleasant tone commands me, “Drink! And no more think. Why suffer earth’s delirious pain? The yearning heart that yearns in vain Will know no peace until the light Goes out in never-ending night. I bring you here the only balm For loneliness. Drink, and be calm! Where all is still no aching mind Can harrow you—peace you will find.” Then Poison hies away; To tempt me when despair May crush me some dread day, And I no longer care! They fail to find me apt, So on comes License garbed In golden lace, and wrapped About her waist a serpent barbed. Hell’s finest figure walks With dignity and grace; Beseechingly she talks, And modest is her face. The fiends do well. They know The jade Must masquerade, Seem innocence, aglow, My loneliness to break and then beguile! The trick is hardly worth a smile. Still I am left alone To wrestle with the spawn That comes from Hell to fawn On me. Can soul atone For this one cruel act of thine, My torturer, divine? Can thoughts so merciless afflict The mind and leave it sane? Or bubbles burst, when they are pricked, And seem the same again? The weariness of longing and its woe, The evil thoughts drear loneliness will sow, The torrid tears, Abhorrent fears, The fretful waiting, The frenzied hating; All come to me, by night, by day, When you are far away. . . . . . Tired mind is easy prey For hideous imagination’s play.