Poetry Friday - An Old Stoic

Since I have started on the poetry of those better known for their other works, I thought I would move on to Emily Brontë. Her poetry goes through the ranges of human states and emotions, as you may see in the next few weeks. Emily was a peculiar, tortured soul. D.H. Lawrence wrote of her: "... life does not mean length of days. Poor old Queen Victoria had length of days. But Emily Brontë had life. She died of it." (And I don't think he meant by that that she was off on great adventures or that she wrote one of the world's greatest novels, but the way she appropriated her experiences in what was really a very quiet life.) And this is the family portrait, of Anne, Emily and Charlotte, that their brother Branwell, stranger and more tortured still, painted himself out of.

THE OLD STOIC

Emily Brontë (1818-1848)

RICHES I hold in light esteem,

And Love I laugh to scorn;

And lust of fame was but a dream

That vanish'd with the morn:

And, if I pray, the only prayer

That moves my lips for me

Is, 'Leave the heart that now I bear,

And give me liberty!'

Yea, as my swift days near their goal,

'Tis all that I implore:

In life and death a chainless soul,

With courage to endure.