Ruin’d at start of the spring; and his eyes grew cloudy with pity
(He was easily touch’d, fine-fibred); then, dark with a bitter pity
For himself and his own spring, spoil’d!
But now again came his mother,
With food, and they ate together; listlessly he, to content her
(No need of eating to-morrow!), and she in her ministry silent
With a tender, responsive silence, for inly she knew his nature.
Not till the meal was done, his dazed, unwilling attention
Sudden she startled and fix’d, with quiet, terrible words.
“Son! Here are two of us, sinners! You know, for I have not conceal’d it—
Name, or ring, I never have had. But now, I must tell, and you listen!
My friend I robb’d of her mate; to his lust I deliver’d my love;
And you I brought into the world, unfather’d, and by me mother’d—
Crippled before the race. O, boy, I have been through it all—all:
I know all the bewilderment—blackness—blasphemy—blankness—
Shame—the cringing abasement—and then the bitter rebellion,
9
