PRESENTIMENT - Arthur Hugh Clough Poems

 
 

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PRESENTIMENT

Something has my heart to say
Something on my brest does weigh
That when I would full fain be gay
     Still pulls me back.

Something evil does this load
Most assuredly forebode,
So my experience sadly shew'd
     Too well I know.

Sometimes, as if with mocking guile
The pain departs a little while,
Then I can dance and sing and smile
     With merry glee --

But soon, to soon it comes again
The sulky, stifling, leaden pain,
As a black cloud is big with rain
     'Tis big with woe.

All I ask is but to know
The depth and nature of the woe.
I hope not for a wind to blow
     The cloud away.

I hear an inarticulate sound
Wherein no fixed sense is found
But sorrow, sorrow without bound
     Of what or where.