A form there was, still spared by timeTill the slow century fill'd its prime;Stretch'd on its bed, with half-closed eyeIt mark'd uncertain shades flit by;Nor scarce the varied world of soundTo the seal'd ear admittance found;While the worn brow, in wrinkles dark,Seem'd like the gnarl'd oak's roughen'd bark.
Oh! e'er did youthful beauty deckThose wither'd limbs, yon living wreck?Did blushes o'er that leathern cheekThe warmth of wild emotion speak?Did rosy health that lip bedew,And kneeling love for favour sue?Alas! alas! for him who bearsA hundred years earth's load of cares.
'Twere vain to ask, what legends oldThat brain might in its chambers hold;What pictures in its gallery fade,By Fancy touch'd or Hope portray'd;For Memory locks the cloister'd cell,And Silence guards the citadel;But still that weary woman's eyeDoth gaze and fix on vacancy.
Yet the faint lungs spontaneous play,The heart's pulsations hold their way,And helpless to the garden borne,Or laid beside the blossom'd thorn,What time the vernal noontide hourGave deeper life to shrub and flower,Methought a quickening influence stoleO'er stagnant veins, and frigid soul.
A knell burst forth! From turret highIts mournful cadence floated by;E'en on that rigid ear it broke,And, strange to say, the tear awoke.Then lo! a hoarse, sepulchral tone,As when imprison'd waters moan,Moved the parch'd lips to utterance free,"Ah! when will that bell toll for me?
"All, all are gone! the husband dear,The loving child, the friend sincere.Once toward their graves with grief I prest,But now I bless their dreamless rest;For lone, amid a stranger-band.Sad relic of the past I stand;Dead at the root, a blasted tree;Ah! when will that bell toll for me?
"Hath Death forgotten? To his hallsChildhood and youthful prime he calls;In bowers of love, or domes of pride,He finds them, wheresoe'er they hide:Fain would they 'scape, but to his sightI hasten, and his shaft invite.Hath God forgot? I bend the knee,Oh, let that knell be toll'd for me!"
