Thoughts of Sadness

Thoughts of Sadness

How sad and forsaken

Is that heavy heart,

Where hope cannot waken,

Nor sorrow depart!

So and so lonely

No inmate is there,

Save one - and that only

Is chilling Despair.

How sad is the slumber

Long sufferings bring,

Whose visions outnumber

The woes whence they spring!

Unblest such repose is,

Its waking is near,

And the eyelid uncloses

Still wet with a tear.

But though sad 'tis to weep

O'er incurable woes -

Sad the dream-disturbed sleep!

Yet far deeper than those

Is the pang of concealing

The woes of the mind

From hearts without feeling -

The gay, the unkind.

For saddest of any

Is he, of the sad,

Who must smile amongst many,

Where many are glad;

Who must join in the laughter,

When laughter goes round,

To plunge deeper after

In grief more profound.

Oh! such smiles like light shining

On ocean's cold wave,

Or the playful entwining

Of sweets o'er a grave;

And such laugh sorrow spurning

At revelry's calls,

Like echoes returning

From lone empty halls.

Unattributed

1:17, p. 68

1827.07.06