----through the vigils of the joyless day and the broken dreams of the
night, there was a charm upon his soul--a hell within himself; and the
curse of his sentence was never to forget.--_Falkland_.
There is a thought that still obtrudes in lone and festive hours;
It falls upon my withered heart like desert winds on flowers:
Oh! read it in my altered brow and in my sunken eye,
I cannot speak it, for the words upon my lips would die.
At evening when I muse alone and calmer visions rise,
Such as will sometimes swim before the veriest wretch's eyes,
That thought will start up suddenly, like spectre from the graves,
And rend the fragile web of joys poor Fancy idly weaves.
In scenes of mirth and revelry I mingle--'tis in vain--
My spirit finds no Lethe in the cup I madly drain;
And when I strive to laugh, like those whose hearts are light and
free--
What ghastly echo of their mirth!--what bitter mockery!
Alas! the silver chord is loosed--the golden bowl is broken;
Remembrance strews my blighted path with many a bitter token;
And on my heart a fearful sign is set forever more--
A burning seal like that they say the wandering Hebrew bore.
For the Southern Literary Messenger.