MUTATION
They talk of short-lived pleasure- be it so-
Pain dies as quickly: stern, hard-featured pain
Expires, and lets her weary prisoner go.
The fiercest agonies have shortest reign;
And after dreams of horror, comes again
The welcome morning with its rays of peace.
Oblivion, softly wiping out the stain,
Makes the strong secret pangs of shame to cease:
Remorse is virtue’s root; its fair increase
Are fruits of innocence and blessedness:
Thus joy, o’erborne and bound, doth still release
His young limbs from the chains that round him press.
Weep not that the world changes- did it keep
A stable, changeless state, ’twere cause indeed to weep.
Chicago: William Cullen Bryant, Mutation Original Sources, accessed December 2, 2024, http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=65YF3SQCNA89LTN.
MLA: Bryant, William Cullen. Mutation, Original Sources. 2 Dec. 2024. http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=65YF3SQCNA89LTN.
Harvard: Bryant, WC, Mutation. Original Sources, retrieved 2 December 2024, from http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=65YF3SQCNA89LTN.
|