Classic Poem

AT THE PHILADELPHIA PENITENTIARY .

Within the prison's massy walls I stood,
And all was still. Down the far galleried aisles
I gazed—upward and near; no eye was seen
No footstep heard, save a few flitting guards
Urging with vacant look their daily round;
For in the precincts of each narrow cell,
Hands, busiest once amid licentious crowds,
Voices that shouted loudest in the throng,
Were now as calm, as erst the winds and waves,
When Jesus said, be still .

I was led on
To where a convict ten slow years had dwelt
A prisoned man. Released that day, he sought
The world again. Wide open stood his door .
Hard by the cell, (where for brief term each day
He walked alone, to feel the blessed breeze
Play on his cheek, or see the sunbeam dawn
Like a fond mother on her erring child,)
There was a little spot of earth, that woke
Within my breast a gush of sudden tears.
His hand had tilled it, and the fresh grass grew
Rewardingly, and springing plants were there
One knows not how , lifting their gentle heads
In kind companionship to that lone man.

 Who can portray how gladly to the eye
Of that past sinner, came in beauty forth
Those springing buds, in nature's lavish love?
Perchance they led him back, in healthful thought,
To some green spot, where, in his early years,
The wild-flower rose like him, unstained and free.

 Oh, many a thought swept o'er my busy mind,
And my heart said, God bless thee, erring one,
Now new born to the world! May heavenly flowers
Spring up and blossom on thy purer way!
 A deep, pathetic consciousness I felt
Stirring my soul in that forsaken cell.
It seemed the nest from which had flown the bird;
Or chrysalis, from whose dark folds had burst
Th' unfettered wing; or grave from whence the spirit,
Wrapp'd in earth's death-robe long, had sprung in joy.
Thus be the door of mercy oped for me ,
And leaving far the prison-house of sin,
Thus may my spirit range.