The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb Volume IV Part 5

Ghost-like, I paced round the haunts of my childhood.

Earth seemed a desart I was bound to traverse, Seeking to find the old familiar faces.

Friend of my bosom, thou more than a brother, Why wert not thou born in my father's dwelling?

So might we talk of the old familiar faces--

How some they have died, and some they have left me, And some are taken from me; all are departed; All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

COMPOSED AT MIDNIGHT

(1797? _Text of_ 1818)

From broken visions of perturbed rest I wake, and start, and fear to sleep again.

How total a privation of all sounds, Sights, and familiar objects, man, bird, beast, Herb, tree, or flower, and prodigal light of heaven.

'Twere some relief to catch the drowsy cry Of the mechanic watchman, or the noise Of revel reeling home from midnight cups.

Those are the moanings of the dying man, Who lies in the upper chamber; restless moans, And interrupted only by a cough Consumptive, torturing the wasted lungs.

So in the bitterness of death he lies, And waits in anguish for the morning's light.

What can that do for him, or what restore?

Short taste, faint sense, affecting notices, And little images of pleasures past, Of health, and active life--health not yet slain, Nor the other grace of life, a good name, sold For sin's black wages. On his tedious bed He writhes, and turns him from the accusing light, And finds no comfort in the sun, but says "When night comes I shall get a little rest."

Some few groans more, death comes, and there an end.

'Tis darkness and conjecture all beyond; Weak Nature fears, though Charity must hope, And Fancy, most licentious on such themes Where decent reverence well had kept her mute, Hath o'er-stock'd h.e.l.l with devils, and brought down, By her enormous fablings and mad lies, Discredit on the gospel's serious truths And salutary fears. The man of parts, Poet, or prose declaimer, on his couch Lolling, like one indifferent, fabricates A heaven of gold, where he, and such as he, Their heads encompa.s.sed with crowns, their heels With fine wings garlanded, shall tread the stars Beneath their feet, heaven's pavement, far removed From d.a.m.ned spirits, and the torturing cries Of men, his breth'ren, fas.h.i.+oned of the earth, As he was, nourish'd with the self-same bread, Belike his kindred or companions once-- Through everlasting ages now divorced, In chains and savage torments to repent Short years of folly on earth. Their groans unheard In heav'n, the saint nor pity feels, nor care, For those thus sentenced--pity might disturb The delicate sense and most divine repose Of spirits angelical. Blessed be G.o.d, The measure of his judgments is not fixed By man's erroneous standard. He discerns No such inordinate difference and vast Betwixt the sinner and the saint, to doom Such disproportion'd fates. Compared with him, No man on earth is holy called: they best Stand in his sight approved, who at his feet Their little crowns of virtue cast, and yield To him of his own works the praise, his due.

Poems at the End of _John Woodvil_, 1802

HELEN

_By Mary Lamb_

(_Summer_, 1800. _Text of_ 1818)

High-born Helen, round your dwelling These twenty years I've paced in vain: Haughty beauty, thy lover's duty Hath been to glory in his pain.

High-born Helen, plainly telling Stories of thy cold disdain; I starve, I die, now you comply, And I no longer can complain.

These twenty years I've lived on tears.

Dwelling for ever on a frown; On sighs I've fed, your scorn my bread; I perish now you kind are grown.

Can I, who loved my beloved But for the scorn "was in her eye,"

Can I be moved for my beloved, When she "returns me sigh for sigh?"

In stately pride, by my bed-side, High-born Helen's portrait's hung; Deaf to my praise, my mournful lays Are nightly to the portrait sung.

To that I weep, nor ever sleep, Complaining all night long to her-- _Helen, grown old, no longer cold_, _Said_, "you to all men I prefer."

BALLAD

_From the German_

(_Spring, 1800. Text of 1818_)

The clouds are blackening, the storms threatening, And ever the forest maketh a moan: Billows are breaking, the damsel's heart aching, Thus by herself she singeth alone, Weeping right plenteously.

"The world is empty, the heart is dead surely, In this world plainly all seemeth amiss: To thy breast, holy one, take now thy little one, I have had earnest of all earth's bliss, Living right lovingly."

HYPOCHONDRIACUS

(_October, 1800. Text of 1818_)

By myself walking, To myself talking, When as I ruminate On my untoward fate, Scarcely seem I Alone sufficiently, Black thoughts continually Crowding my privacy; They come unbidden, Like foes at a wedding, Thrusting their faces In better guests' places, Peevish and malecontent, Clownish, impertinent, Das.h.i.+ng the merriment: So in like fas.h.i.+ons Dim cogitations Follow and haunt me, Striving to daunt me.

In my heart festering, In my ears whispering, "Thy friends are treacherous, Thy foes are dangerous, Thy dreams ominous."

Fierce Anthropophagi, Spectra, Diaboli, What scared St. Anthony, Hobgoblins, Lemures, Dreams of Antipodes, Night-riding Incubi Troubling the fantasy, All dire illusions Causing confusions; Figments heretical, Scruples fantastical, Doubts diabolical, Abaddon vexeth me, Mahu perplexeth me, Lucifer teareth me----

_Jesu! Maria! liberate nos ab his diris tentationibus Inimici_.

A BALLAD:

_Noting the Difference of Rich and Poor, in the Ways of a Rich n.o.ble's Palace and a Poor Workhouse_

_To the tune of the "Old and Young Courtier"_

(_August, 1800. Text of 1818_)

In a costly palace Youth goes clad in gold; In a wretched workhouse Age's limbs are cold: There they sit, the old men by a s.h.i.+vering fire, Still close and closer cowering, warmth is their desire.