‘A woman ... hear me,—let me make it plain,— A woman ... not a monster ... both her breasts Made right to suckle babes ... she took me off, A woman also, young and ignorant, And heavy with my grief, my two poor eyes Near washed away with weeping, till the trees, The blessed unaccustomed trees and fields, Ran either side the train, like stranger dogs Unworthy of any notice,—took me off, So dull, so blind, and only half alive, Not seeing by what road, nor by what ship, Nor toward what place, nor to what end of all.— Men carry a corpse thus,—past the doorway, past The garden-gate, the children’s playground, up The green lane,—then they leave it in the pit, To sleep and find corruption, cheek to cheek With him who stinks since Friday. ‘But suppose; To go down with one’s soul into the grave,— To go down half dead, half alive, I say, And wake up with corruption, ... cheek to cheek With him who stinks since Friday! There it is, And that’s the horror of ’t, Miss Leigh. ‘You feel? You understand?—no, do not look at me, But understand. The blank, blind, weary way Which led ... where’er it led ... away, at least; The shifted ship ... to Sydney or to France ... Still bound, wherever else, to another land; The swooning sickness on the dismal sea, The foreign shore, the shameful house, the night, The feeble blood, the heavy-headed grief, ... No need to bring their damnable drugged cup, And yet they brought it! Hell’s so prodigal Of devil’s gifts ... hunts liberally in packs, Will kill no poor small creature of the wilds But fifty red wide throats must smoke at it,— As HIS at me ... when waking up at last ... I told you that I waked up in the grave.