To Mrs. —

I have not found the meaning outThat lies in wrong, and pain and strife;I know not why we grope through grief,Tear-blind, to touch the higher life.

In my unconscious viens there runs,Perchance, some old ancestral taint;In Eve I sinned. Poor Eve and I!We each may utter one complaint—

One and the same—for knowledge cameToo late to save her paradise;And I my paradise have lostForsooth because I am not wise.

O, vain traditions, small the aidWe women gather from your lore;Why, when the world was lost, did deathNot come our children's birth before?

It had been better to have diedSole prey of death, and ended so,Than to have dragged through endless timeOne long, unbroken trail of woe.

To suffer, yet not expiate;To die at last yet not atone;To mourn our heirship to a guiltErased by innocent blood alone!

You lift your hands in shocked surprise,You say enough I have not prayed;Can prayer go back through centuriesAnd change the web of fate one braid?

Nay, own the truth, and say that weAre but the bonded slaves of doom.Unconscious to the cradle came,Unwilling must go to the tomb.

I wait to find the meaning outThat lies beyond the bitter end;Comfort yourself with wearying heaven,I find no comfort, O my friend.