The dream was over. I had married one
Who was the sport of vagrant impulses.
We had not been a fortnight wed, when he
Came home to me with brandy in his brain--
A maudlin fool--for love like mine to hide
As if he were an unclean beast. O Grace!
I cannot paint the horrors of that night.
My heart, till then serene, and safely kept
In Trust's strong citadel, quaked all night long,
As tower and bastion fell before the rush
Of fierce convictions; and the tumbling walls
Boomed with dull throbs of ruin through my brain.
And there were palaces that leaned on this--
Castles of air, in long and glittering lines,
Which melted into air, and pierced the blue
That marks the star-strewn vault of heaven;--all fell,
With a faint crash like that which scares the soul
When dissolution shivers through a dream
Smitten by nightmare,--fell and faded all
To utter nothingness; and when the morn
Flamed up the East, and with its crimson wings
Brushed out the paling stars that all the night
In silent, slow procession, one by one,
Had gazed upon me through the open sash,
And passed along, it found me desolate.

The stupid dreamer at my side awoke,
And with such helpless anguish as they feel
Who know that they are weak as well as vile.
I saw, through all his forward promises,