Page:Reuben and other poems.pdf/29

 That summer went, that autumn, winter, spring. Next summer came, and still she linger’d on And could not die: a piteous creature now, Whose weary world to the rack’d body’s sense, At furthest to her chamber wall was shrunk. Whose set monotony of pain no care Could vary now; the gentle garrulousness Gone, the brave cheer of that sunshiny spirit Quench’d; even for Reuben scarce a greeting now. A whole once-happy kindly human being Turn’d to a fine machine for feeling pain, Whose intervals of rest were nothingness. Alive, yet lifeless: dying, far from death: Obscure, to signal martyrdom adjudged: Innocent, with inhuman tortures wrung. —O strange, inscrutable world!

For Reuben now No sweet shared vigil, no reviving change For Sarah. But the neighbours to and fro Came with kind aid; and went with strange reports. Reuben was rarely altered. Age was age And trouble trouble—but what trouble need Glue up the lips and screw the eyelids down, And make a man as shy of company As if he was himself a bit of gold And all his neighbours thieves? And as to age— He did look wan and wisht, not Mercy’s face Show’d more the bone—yet see what strength he had!