Euthanasia

Willis Gaylord Clark (1808–1841)

METHINKS, when on the languid eye

Life’s autumn scenes grow dim;

When evening’s shadows veil the sky;

And pleasure’s siren hymn

Grows fainter on the tuneless ear,

Like echoes from another sphere,

Or dreams of seraphim—

It were not sad to cast away

This dull and cumbrous load of clay.

It were not sad to feel the heart

Grow passionless and cold;

To feel those longings to depart

That cheered the good of old;

To clasp the faith which looks on high,

Which fires the Christian’s dying eye,

And makes the curtain-fold

That falls upon his wasting breast,

The door that leads to endless rest.

It seems not lonely thus to lie

On that triumphant bed,

Till the pure spirit mounts on high

By white-winged seraphs led:

Where glories, earth may never know,

O’er “many mansions” lingering glow,

In peerless lustre shed.

It were not lonely thus to soar

Where sin and grief can sting no more.

And though the way to such a goal

Lies through the clouded tomb,

If on the free, unfettered soul

There rest no stains of gloom,

How should its aspirations rise

Far through the blue unpillared skies,

Up to its final home,

Beyond the journeyings of the sun,

Where streams of living waters run!