Why should I ask for sunshine on my heart,
If with it, it must wither? ask thyself.
Reading thine own heart’s secret, thou may’st learn
How much I needed sympathy. My path,
Now filled with rankest weeds, might have been pure
Under thy smile and teaching. Now, too late!
To wrestle with the world for an existence,
Bowed, but not crushed by Fate, is of itself
Enough to turn the heart to bitter gall,
And make it curse, where, in its sunnier hours,