Classic Poem

For I, called Lazarus, the Resurrected,
Affirm that false is what the Prophet saith;
I, who have seen decay, and doom, and death,
Loudly attest, until my dying breath,
That we, earth's worms, by God are unprotected.

Beyond the tomb's most explicable portal,
Shuddering, I tell to you that there is naught!
Unteach, unteach, all that ye have been taught,
Seek not, oh world! what ye have ever sought!
There is no Heaven! There is no soul immortal!

Hearken to me, oh multitudes ill-fated,
Ye who through life so penitently plod,
Bending before a phantom creed and rod,
Know there is no hereafter and no God,
Know that your every hope will be frustrated.

For life beyond the tomb existed never.
Nothingness, void and silence come to all.
Pray not, for none will ever hear your call;
Pray not, for Death's chill answer will appall;
The soul dies with the body and forever.

There is no fertile Paradise that waits us
When flesh doth rot, and what we call a soul
Is matter, like our flesh, and hath no goal;
No pitying angels with our pains condole;
There is no hope when cruel death prostrates us.

I have been dead; the sepulcher did take me;
Yet I knew naught, although they do assert
I lay for days in dolorous gloom inert;
Yet to naught palpable can I revert,
Till the calm voice of Jesus did awake me.

No dream, no vision lulled me as I rested,
No sight celestial did I see, no sound
Of angel songs did in my ears resound;
No sense, no thought came to me prone and bound,
Until his word my deathliness molested.

Yet for three days I lay in dismal cerements,
Three days and nights, while no thing did I see;
Oh! hesitant friend, why didst thou come to me,
Bid Death depart, command me to be free,
And honor me there with thy serene endearments?