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SHELTERED — UNSHELTERED.
191
I fought, and I failed, and am vanquished !
They will not be better for me ;
The people will go to destruction,
The multitude will not be free.
Perhaps I mistook my vocation,
Was " meant for a worker for bread,
And not for a Moses or Aaron " —
'Twas wise, though 'twas sneeringly said.
One friend did believe in me truly,
But that must have been a mistake,
As she must herself have discovered,
Or else she would never forsake.
Well, others have suffered as I do ;
I am but a sheep-dog grown old ;
Grown old in the spring of my manhood,
I shrivel up here in the cold :
The cold, and the sleet, and the darkness,
The oozing and fog-laden rain ;
Fit adjuncts of this, mine attainment,
And meet for my bridal of pain.
