Lives blurred by grief and sin.
Barred close from warmth & light.
Visions of beauty win.
Through fancy's magic night.

Spent souls at close of fray.
Shorn of all gifts but pain.
Shrink from the narrow way.
And gaze at day again.

In thews of grinding ice
Fast in its death cold seams.
Of warmth and sunny skies.
The Arctic Cast away dreams -

No Instants flash and gleam
No brief reprieve from pain.
Or lapse in [del: lovely dovey?] [above: stony] dream -
For those whom love hath slain .
Oct- 18 - 1884.      Sept - 86 - -

[by Susan Dickinson]