I wept to think how hard it were To kill my babe, and take from it The sense of light, and the warm air, And my own fond and tender care, And love and smiles; ere I knew yet _375 That these for it might, as for me, Be the masks of a grinning mockery. And haply, I would dream, 'twere sweet To feed it from my faded breast, Or mark my own heart's restless beat _380 Rock it to its untroubled rest, And watch the growing soul beneath Dawn in faint smiles; and hear its breath, Half interrupted by calm sighs, And search the depth of its fair eyes _385 For long departed memories! And so I lived till that sweet load Was lightened. Darkly forward flowed The stream of years, and on it bore Two shapes of gladness to my sight; _390 Two other babes, delightful more In my lost soul's abandoned night, Than their own country ships may be Sailing towards wrecked mariners, Who cling to the rock of a wintry sea. _395 For each, as it came, brought soothing tears; And a loosening warmth, as each one lay Sucking the sullen milk away About my frozen heart, did play, And weaned it, oh how painfully-- _400 As they themselves were weaned each one From that sweet food,--even from the thirst Of death, and nothingness, and rest, Strange inmate of a living breast! Which all that I had undergone _405 Of grief and shame, since she, who first The gates of that dark refuge closed, Came to my sight, and almost burst The seal of that Lethean spring; But these fair shadows interposed: _410 For all delights are shadows now! And from my brain to my dull brow The heavy tears gather and flow: I cannot speak: Oh, let me weep! The tears which fell from her wan eyes _415 Glimmered among the moonlight dew: Her deep hard sobs and heavy sighs Their echoes in the darkness threw. When she grew calm, she thus did keep The tenor of her tale: He died: _420 I know not how: he was not old, If age be numbered by its years: But he was bowed and bent with fears, Pale with the quenchless thirst of gold, Which, like fierce fever, left him weak; _425 And his strait lip and bloated cheek Were warped in spasms by hollow sneers; And selfish cares with barren plough, Not age, had lined his narrow brow, And foul and cruel thoughts, which feed _430 Upon the withering life within, Like vipers on some poisonous weed. Whether his ill were death or sin None knew, until he died indeed, And then men owned they were the same. _435