Riches I hold in light esteem,
And Love I laugh to scorn;
And lust of fame was but a dream,
That vanished with the morn:And if I pray, the only prayer
That moves my lips for me
Is, ‘Leave the heart that now I bear,
And give me liberty!’Yes, as my swift days near their goal,
Emily Brontë, “The Old Stoic,” from Clement King Shorter, editor, The Complete Poems of Emily Brontë (1908).
’Tis all that I implore;
In life and death a chainless soul,
With courage to endure.
