I look on them, weeping in sorrow,
And think: "When the Reaper has come--
When finds me no longer the morrow--
What aid then?--from whom will they borrow
The crust of dry bread and the home?

"What harbors that morrow," I wonder,
"For them when the breadwinner's gone?
When sudden and swift as the thunder
The bread-bond is broken asunder,
And friend in the world there is none."

A numbness my brain is o'ertaking...
To sleep for a moment I drop:
Then start!... In the east light is breaking!--
I drag myself, ailing and aching,
Again to the gloom of the shop.




The Candle Seller


In Hester Street, hard by a telegraph post,
There sits a poor woman as wan as a ghost.
Her pale face is shrunk, like the face of the dead,
And yet you can tell that her cheeks once were red.
But love, ease and friendship and glory, I ween,