And absence does not break a chain with thee;
No sudden agonies dart through thy breast;
Thou hast what all men covet,—Real Rest.
I have an outward frame, unlike to thine,
Warm with young life—not cold in death's decline;
An eye that sees the sunny light of Heaven,—
A heart by pleasure thrilled, by anguish riven—
But, in exchange for thy untroubled calm,
Thy gift of cold oblivion's healing balm,
I'd give my youth, my health, my life to come,