Untitled 2

I'm out in the world once more,
And I mean to run the rig,
For I've learned from the prison lore
That the pauper fares worse than the prig.
I've shivered and starved in vain,
And been honest for months in rag,
So if I'm convicted again,
I think it won't be on the vag.

poem by Owen Suffolk
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Untitled 3

Nothing seems changed; here's the oaken chair,
That every night I knelt beside,
As I whispered to God the simple prayer
I learned from my mother when I was her pride.
The old familiar things of then,
Unchanged, are beautiful still to the now;
But I am transformed in heart, and when
Will guilt ever cease to shadow my brow?

poem by Owen Suffolk
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Untitled 6

I am so lonely,
I am so sad,
Speak one word only
To make my heart glad,
Pass not in silence,
For silence is scorn,
I am so wretched,
Unloved, and forlorn.

In darkness sorrow
I think through the night
That each coming morrow
Brings thee to my sight
As a star sent to brighten
My gloom with a beam;
And I fall asleep ever
With these for a dream.

I know it is madness

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poem by Owen Suffolk
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For Frank Gardiner

It is not in a prison drear
Where all around is gloom,
That I would end life's wild career,
And sink into the tomb,
For though my spirit's ever bold
Each tyrant to defy;
Still, still, within a dungeon cold,
I could not calmly die.

It is not that my cheek would pale
Within a lonely cell;
It is not that my heart would quail
To bid this world farewell.
For if oppressed by tyrant foe
I'd freely be the first
To give my life, and strike the blow
To lay him in the dust.

But place me in a forest glen
Unfettered, wild and free,

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poem by Owen Suffolk
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Untitled 7

Fame surrounds us with a glory,
Dazzling as the noon-day sun,
And upon the page of story,
Blazons deeds of greatness done.
But 'tis love that sheds a brightness
Round us that can ne'er depart,
And with its own gentle lightness,
Writes its records on the heart.

Fame may stir the soul within us,
Half with pleasure, half with pain;
And a world's applause may win us
With its many-echoed strain.
But the song of love's own singing,
Though 'tis breathed by one alone,
Ever to the heart is bringing,
New-born raptures in its tone.

Give to me one fair form near me,
And I'll sigh no more for fame;

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poem by Owen Suffolk
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Untitled 5

An exile captive, severed from his home,
Torn from the friends he loved in life's sweet spring;
Heart-broken toils, while still his sad thoughts roam
Back to the past which now no joys can bring;
Vainly he seeks compassion and relief
In human hearts around, to cheer of soothe his grief.

As hard the steel, so hard the flinty rock,
Whose grating echoes jest but at his woe;
The quivering iron yields but to the shock,
While down his bosom's height the cold drops flow,
His bleeding hands show many a sanguine spot,
Though seen by human eyes, by human hearts forgot.

There's not a sigh his spirit's grief hath sped,
There's not a dew-drop wrung by tyranny,
Nor yet one scorching tear his sould hath shed,
Nor bloody stain of silent agony,
But God hath seen, and hath recorded true,
To render unto man according to his due.

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poem by Owen Suffolk
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Untitled 1

I gladly would sing in a joyous strain,
But my heart of its joy is bereft;
For my young life there is nought but grief and pain,
And a haunting memory left.
Look at the stars how they gleam from the skies
On me with a frosty stare;
Can it be that this world hath no pitying eyes
For the houseless child of care?
Ye that look on me have homes tonight,
And loving ones wait you there;
And the cheerful fire is burning bright,
And young faces are beaming fair.
Though a thousand homes are around I know
'Mong them all there is no home for me:
For I must sleep in the cold white snow,
And the skies must my shelter be.
My life is still in its summer years,
But its flowers can bloom no more;
I weep - and mine are the bitter tears
That are wept for the joys of yore.

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poem by Owen Suffolk
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The Real And The Ideal

I feel I have - and who has not?
An inner and outer life:
The one may be a dreary lot,
With sorrow and with suff'ring rife;
While in the other may be found
A magic world of fancies fair,
Where brightest dreams of joy abound,
And never enters dark despair.

The life I live may seem to those
Who gaze upon it outwardly
A drear existence, full of woes
And never-ceasing misery;
But in the mystic life of mind,
Abstracted from earth's things of sense,
Oblivious to my grief, I find
A joy exalted and intense.

My outward life is prison-gloomed,
My life of dreams is fancy free;

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poem by Owen Suffolk
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My Memory's Care

Sing not to me a song of beauty bright,
Nor festive scenes of dazzling light;
Nor of gorgeous pageant in palace hall
Begemmed with many a coronal;
But sing to me my memory's care -
The misspent hours fled where - oh where?

Sing not to me of the battlefield,
Nor splintered lance nor of broken shield,
Not of gory plumes once freshly fair,
Not of banners rent nor pennon bare;
But sing to me my memory's care -
The misspent hours fled where - oh where?

Sing not to me of the sea-fight won,
By daring hearts and by flashing gun,
Not how o'er the deep in exultant glee
The victor's ship speeds galliantly;
But sing to me my memory's care -
The misspent hours fled where - oh where?

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poem by Owen Suffolk
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The Battle of Life

Up! and arm for life's struggle,
We shall conquer in the fight,
If we arm us for the battle
With the weapons Truth and Right;
Though the world's arrayed against us,
We will shrink not from the strife,
For invincible is duty
On the battlefield of life.

In the vanguard of the battle
Foremost comes our foeman Sin,
Like a giant in his prowess,
With an aspect stern and grim.
But, though mighty in his power
We'll preserve a dauntless air,
And we'll fight this dreaded foeman
'Neath the sturdy shield of prayer.

Next is Poverty approaching,
Weapons sure and sharp she wears,

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poem by Owen Suffolk
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