Free

I am no longer afraid of acknowledgement.
I have walked surely with a staff of doubt,
Confident of my sureness!
But that was not today. Lo, my heart
Breaked, the walls about it crumbling,
And a shaft of sunlight filtered through.
Oh, in the darkness of that retreat,
Where I had laid secluded-
The mould of my memory,
The withering blossoms of my hopes,
The spice of my desire-something stirred!
I know not were it but a phantom,
A little white hope, struggling,
Or the wing of some desire stirred,
Or were it memory sighing?
Yet 'twere a troth that all wert
Not dead within, and I am unafraid
Of the announcement of my faith!