Page:Ambarvalia - Clough (1849).djvu/91

 Now but a spark that blackness yawns to swallow. The spark expired! Expired my hope with it?

From the pierhead into the dark I stared, I strained my starting eyes: was nought to see. As I upon a promont of creation, Where it o'erjects the inexistent void, Had stood to gaze, so gazed I from the pier; So fearfully the blind wave of nothingness Rolled up against my eyeballs, with a pain That seemed to quench my soul: my blood, I had said, Knew no more motion—frozen in its spring. Nought in the deep! Nought in the sky! No sky! No deep! I only standing on the pier, My back against that world, that only was, From which I had just beheld its only good Pass out into the nought!

For life I yearned, For substance, sweet assurance, strong reality. They were behind me, and beneath my foot Swelled the solidity for which I yearned; Yet nor behind me could I bear to look — To see the mountains, lights, and breathing town, Nor downward look— to see the well-cut flags,