Page:Prometheus Bound, and other poems.djvu/86

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Why, in that single glance I had

Of my child's face,. . I tell you all,

I saw a look that made me mad. .

The master's look, that used to fall

On my soul like his lash. . or worse!—

And so, to save it from my curse,

I twisted it round in my shawl.

And he moaned and trembled from foot to head,

He shivered from head to foot;

Till, after a time, he lay instead

Too suddenly still and mute.

I felt beside a stiffening cold. .

I dared to lift up just a fold,. .

As in lifting a leaf of the mango-fruit.

But my fruit. . ha, ha!—there, had been

(I laugh to think on't at this hour! . .)

Your fine white angels, who have seen

Nearest the secret of God's power,. .

And plucked my fruit to make them wine,

And sucked the soul of that child of mine,

As the humming-bird sucks the soul of the flower.

Ha, ha, for the trick of the angels white!

They freed the white child's spirit so.

I said not a word, but, day and night,

I carried the body to and fro;