POETRY.
A MODERN MALADY.
To be without an impulse or desire, A heap of fuel with no spark of fire ; To be a prey to modish melancholy, Without the force for any other folly ; To watch the movement of the Universe, And to believe it moves from bad to worse, Blind tendency the master of the whole, And man without a purpose or a soul ; To see the good and evil, foul and fair, And not to take a side and not to care, But live contented in a calm despair.
Not live ! exist ; with power and passion fled, A lean heart nourishing a thinking head.
I, musing on these matters, walked apart, To be at peace and commune with my heart.
Ah ! if the Gods were gracious to us, then Some new Prometheus would be granted men, And as I mused, I thought one spoke with me : " I brought the fire from Heaven," he said, " but aye Your eyes are holden that ye cannot see." M. E. R.
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