OUT of the body for ever,
Wearily sobbing, -Oh, whither?â?
A Soul that hath wasted its chances
Floats on the limitless ether.
Lost in dim, horrible blankness;
Drifting like wind on a sea,
Untraversed and vacant and moaning,
Nor shallow nor shore on the lee!
Helpless, unfriended, forsaken;
Haunted and tracked by the Past,
With fragments of pitiless voices,
And desolate faces aghast!
One saith--It is well that he goeth
Naked and fainting with cold,
Who worshipped his sweet-smelling garments,
Arrayed with the cunning of old!
-Hark! how he crieth, my brothers,
With pain for the glittering things
He saw on the shoulders of Rulers,
And the might in the mouths of the Kings!
-This Soul hath been one of the idlers
Who wait with still hands, when they lack
For Fortune, like Joseph, to throw them
The cup thrust in Benjamin-s sack.
-Now, had he been faithful in striving,
And warring with Wrong to the sword,
He must have passed over these spaces
Caught up in the arms of the Lord.â?
A second: -Lo, Passion was wilful;
And, glad with voluptuous sighs,
He held it luxurious trouble
To ache for luxurious eyes!
-She bound him, the woman resplendent;
She withered his strength with her stare;
And Faith hath been twisted and strangled
With folds of her luminous hair!
-Was it well, O you wandering wailer,
Abandoned in terrible space,
To halt on the highway to Heaven
Because of a glittering face?â?
And another: -Behold, he was careful:
He faltered to think of his Youth,
Dejected and weary and footsore,
Alone on the dim road to Truth.
-If the way had been shorter and greener
And brighter, he might have been brave;
But the goal was too far and he fainted,
Like Peter with Christ on the wave!â?
Beyond the wild haunts of the mockers-
Far in the distance and gray,
Floateth that sorrowful spirit
Away, and away, and away.
Pale phantoms fly past it, like shadows:
Dim eyes that are blinded with tears;
Old faces all white with affliction-
The ghosts of the wasted dead years!
-Soul that hath ruined us, shiver
And moan when you know us,â? they cry-
-Behold, I was part of thy substance!â?-
-And Iâ?-saith another--and I!â?
Drifting from starless abysses
Into the ether sublime,
Where is no upward nor downward,
Nor region nor record of Time!
Out of the Body for ever
No refuge-no succour nor stay-
Floated that sorrowful Spirit
Away, and away, and away.
For Ever
Henry Kendall
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Poem topics: alone, brave, faith, hair, heaven, lost, pain, passion, sea, space, strength, time, truth, wind, woman, wild, shore, sweet, white, wait, Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
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