Take all there is--take hand and heart:
There must be somewhere work to do.
HELEN HUNT JACKSON.
[9] Her last poem: 7 August, 1885.
FAREWELL, LIFE.
WRITTEN DURING SICKNESS, APRIL, 1845.
Farewell, life! my senses swim.
And the world is growing dim;
Thronging shadows cloud the light,
Like the advent of the night,--
Colder, colder, colder still,
Upward steals a vapor chill;
Strong the earthly odor grows,--
I smell the mold above the rose!
Welcome, life! the spirit strives!
Strength returns and hope revives;
Cloudy fears and shapes forlorn
Fly like shadows at the morn,--
O'er the earth there comes a bloom;
Sunny light for sullen gloom,
Warm perfume for vapor cold,--
smell the rose above the mold!
THOMAS HOOD.
FOR ANNIE.
Thank Heaven! the crisis,--
The danger is past,
And the lingering illness
Is over at last,--
And the fever called "Living"
Is conquered at last.
Sadly, I know,
I am shorn of my strength,
And no muscle I move
As I lie at full length,--
But no matter!--I feel
I am better at length.
And I rest so composedly
Now, in my bed,
That any beholder
Might fancy me dead,--
Might start at beholding me,
Thinking me dead.
The moaning and groaning,
The sighing and sobbing,
Are quieted now,
With that horrible throbbing
At heart,--ah, that horrible,
Horrible throbbing!
The sickness, the nausea,
The pitiless pain,
Have ceased, with the fever
That maddened my brain,--
With the fever called "Living"
That burned in my brain.
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