My Virtual Reading Room

TIRED.

I am tired tonight, and something,
The wind maybe, or the rain,
Or the cry of a bird in the copse outside,
Has brought back the past and its pain.
And I feel, as I sit here thinking,
That the hand of a dead old June
Has reached out hold of my heart's loose strings,
And is drawing them up in tune.

I am tired tonight, and I miss you,
And I long for you, love, through tears;
And it seems but today that I saw you go--
You, who have been gone for years.
And I seem to be newly lonely--
I, who am so much alone;
And the strings of my heart are well in tune
But they have not the same old tone.

I am tired; and that old sorrow
Sweeps down the bed of my soul,
As a turbulent river might suddenly break
Away from a dam's control.
It beareth a wreck on its bosom,
A wreck with a snow-white sail,
And the hand on my heart-strings thrums away,
But they only respond with a wail.

(Ella Wheeler Wilcox)