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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=117568" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Soliloquy of a Duellist</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">They all at length have left me—long I wish'd<br>While round me with officious care they stood,<br>To dress this paltry wound, to be alone;<br>And now I find that solitude is dreadful—<br>Dreadful to one, upon whose burning soul,<br>The weight of murder rests! Oh, would to heaven<br>This day were blotted from the scroll of time:<br>Or, as indeed it seems, that some wild dream<br>Had wrapp'd me in its horrid tangled maze.<br>It is a dream,—it must be,—o'er my brain<br>Such strange bewildering seenes in memory crowd,<br>As are not, cannot be reality;<br>And yet this agony is too intense,<br>'T would rive the chains of sleep. This stiffen'd arm,<br>These bandages, and the sharp pain which shoots<br>Across my burning temples—these are real—<br>Oh, no—'t is not the phantasy of sleep—<br>He does lie bleeding, yonder, pale and dead;<br>I, too, am slightly wounded.—Would to heaven<br>The erring ball, that pierced this guilty arm,<br>Had found a goal within my guiltier breast,<br>Ere I had lived to be a murderer—<br>A hateful murderer, still living on<br>Beneath the weight, the torment of a curse,<br>Heavy as that of Cain, the stain of blood<br>Forever on my conscience, crying out<br>To heaven for vengeance. Yet my wounded honour<br>Claim'd, sure, some reparation for the blot<br>His language on it cast. Could I have lived<br>Beneath the brand of cowardice, and borne<br>The sneer and the expression of contempt,<br>That would have follow'd me from every lip?<br>He gave the challenge, and could I refuse?<br>I could not—yet I might—I could—I could—<br>The offence was mine, and mine is all the guilt.<br>Why o'er my heated passions could I not<br>One instant hold the reins of self-control?<br>One single moment of deliberate thought<br>And cloudless reason, would have spared me all<br>This guilt, this agony. The approving smiles<br>Of peaceful conscience, and mine own respect,<br>Had balanced well the idle laugh of fools—<br>And now, what am I now? I dare not think!<br>The stain of life-blood is upon my soul—<br>The life-blood of my friend—he was my friend,<br>And I have kill'd him! Oh, that this dark hour<br>Of deep remorseful anguish might recall<br>The moments that have pass'd. My wife!—my wife!<br>I cannot meet thee thus. I hate myself—<br>All whom I have loved, and e'en thou wilt hate me.<br>Oh! would that I were dead—I will not live<br>To meet thy tearful eye in sorrow bent<br>O'er one who once could wake its proudest smile.<br>I cannot pray—I dare not call on Heaven,<br>To pardon my offence—before the throne,<br>Even at the mercy-seat, his bleeding form<br>Would mock my agony, and drive me thence.<br>How can I look on those whose hearts my hand<br>Has made so desolate? His mother's eye<br>Has often smiled in kindness on my boyhood,<br>And such has been my gratitude, to wring<br>The last bright drops of comfort from her heart,<br>And cloud the evening of her life with woe.<br>His sisters, in their tears, demand of me<br>Their loved, their murder'd one—and there he lies,<br>Cut off in all the bloom of health and youth.<br>There lies the fatal instrument, and there<br>Its fellow lies to tempt me—loaded still;<br>I dare not think—the future and the past<br>Are fraught alike with images of horror.<br>Blood calls for blood, and mine own hand shall pay<br>The debt of justice. Crime shall wash out crime—<br>I dare not look into eternity—<br>Oh, God! Oh, God! forgive me for this deed!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Elizabeth+Margaret+Chandler">Elizabeth Margaret Chandler</a> from <i>Poetical Works</i><div class=q>
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<script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=117568" data-title="Soliloquy of a Duellist de Elizabeth Margaret Chandler" data-description="They all at length have left me—long I wish'd/While round me with officious care they stood,/To dress this paltry wound, to be alone;/And now I find that solitude is dreadful—/Dreadful to one, upon whose burning soul,/The weight of murder rest..."></div>
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