I pass to death. But let me bear my fate,
And calmly be forgot;
A thousand others in the self-same state
Await the self-same lot.
And what were friends to me? Oh! one kind voice
Heard through those prison-bars,
Did it not make my drooping heart rejoice,
Though from my murderers
’Twas bought, perhaps? Alas! how soon life ends!
And yet why should my death
Make any one unhappy? Live, my friends.
Nor think my fleeting breath
Calls you to come. Mayhap, in days gone by,
I, too, from sight of sorrow
Turned, careless, with self-wrapt unpitying eye,
Not dreaming of the morrow.
And now misfortune presses on my heart,
Erewhile so strong and free,
’Twere craven to ask you to bear its smart—
Farewell, nor think of me!
*****
As a faint ray or zephyr’s latest breath
Revives the dying day,
Beneath the scaffold, that stern throne of death,
I sing my parting lay.
Before an hour, with wakeful foot and loud,
Has marked its journey’s close
On yon bright disc, the sleep of death shall shroud
Mine eyes from worldly woes!