To whom do I speak to-day? To whom do I speak to-day? To whom do I speak to-day? Faces pass away, Every man with face lower than those of his brothers. To whom do I speak to-day? Hearts are thievish, The man upon whom one leans has no understanding. To whom do I speak to-day? There are no righteous, The land is left to those who do iniquity. To whom do I speak to-day? There is dearth of the faithful, To whom do I speak to-day? There is none here of contented heart; Go with him (the apparently contented) and he is not here. To whom do I speak to-day? I am laden with wretchedness, To whom do I speak to-day? It hath no end. DEATH A GLAD RELEASE Death is before me to-day 15 Like the recovery of a sick man, Like going forth into a garden after sickness. Death is before me to-day Like the odor of myrrh, Like sitting under the sail on a windy day. Death is before me to-day Like the odor of lotus-flowers, Like sitting on the shore of drunkenness. Death is before me to-day Like the course of the freshet, Like the return of a man from the war-galley to his house. Death is before me to-day Like the clearing of the sky, Like a man fowling therein toward that which he knew not. Death is before me to-day As a man longs to see his house When he has spent years in captivity. 15 The soul of the sufferer had shrunk back from death, and, like the Song of the Harper, proposed a life of pleasure as a way of escape. Then moved by the terror of death, and the hopelessness of material preparations to meet it, the unhappy man recoiled for a moment and turned to contemplate life. The two poems we have just read depict what he sees as he thus turns. What follows is the logical rebound from any faint hope that life may be possible, to the final conviction that death alone is the release from the misery in which he is involved. This third poem is a hymn in praise of death. THE HIGH PRIVILEGES OF THE SOJOURN YONDER He who is yonder Shall seize the culprit as a living god, 16 Inflicting punishment of wickedness on the doer of it. He who is yonder Shall stand in the celestial bark, Causing that the choicest of the offerings there be given to the temples. He who is yonder Shall be a wise man who has not been repelled, Praying to Re when he speaks. 16 Earlier in the struggle with his soul, the sufferer had expressed the conviction that he should be justified hereafter. He now returns to this conviction in this fourth poem, with which the remarkable document closes. |