The turf splits open, and from the hole
Bursts forth an unhappy sighing,
"Alas, alas, for my wretched soul!"
'Tis poor damned Margaret crying!
The lad he leaps like a wounded deer,
And were not his guardian angel near
Some digger might find in a marshy knoll
Where his little bleached bones were lying.
But the ground grows firmer beneath his feet,
And there from over the meadow
A lamp is flickering homely-sweet;
The boy at the edge of the shadow
Looks back as he pauses to take his breath,
And in his glance is the fear of death.
'Twas eerie there 'mid the sedge and peat,
Ah, that was a place to dread, O!
ON THE TOWER[1] (1842)
I stand aloft on the balcony.
The starlings around me crying,
And let like masnad my hair stream free
To the storm o'er the ramparts flying.
Oh headlong wind, on this narrow ledge
I would I could try thy muscle
And, breast to breast, two steps from the edge,
Fight it out in a deadly tussle.
Beneath me I see, like hounds at play.
How billow on billow dashes;
Yea, tossing aloft the glittering spray,
The fierce throng hisses and clashes.
Oh, might I leap into the raging flood
And urge on the pack to harry
- ↑ Translator: Charles Wharton Stork.
