678. Rosalind’s Scroll

I LEFT thee last, a child at heart,
A woman scarce in years:
I come to thee, a solemn corpse
Which neither feels nor fears.
I have no breath to use in sighs;	5
They laid the dead-weights on mine eyes
To seal them safe from tears.

Look on me with thine own calm look:
I meet it calm as thou.
No look of thine can change this smile,	10
Or break thy sinful vow:
I tell thee that my poor scorn’d heart
Is of thine earth—thine earth—a part:
It cannot vex thee now.

I have pray’d for thee with bursting sob	15
When passion’s course was free;
I have pray’d for thee with silent lips
In the anguish none could see;
They whisper’d oft, ‘She sleepeth soft’—
But I only pray’d for thee.	20

Go to! I pray for thee no more:
The corpse’s tongue is still;
Its folded fingers point to heaven,
But point there stiff and chill:
No farther wrong, no farther woe	25
Hath licence from the sin below
Its tranquil heart to thrill.

I charge thee, by the living’s prayer,
And the dead’s silentness,
To wring from out thy soul a cry	30
Which God shall hear and bless!
Lest Heaven’s own palm droop in my hand,
And pale among the saints I stand,
A saint companionless.