Classic Poem

WHEREIN HE ANTICIPATES THEIR MOMENTARY REUNION

From hour to hour I seem to hear her calling —
My Lady calling! Gladly would I answer!
I feel decay within me like a cancer;
And am so changed — with more than gray years crawling —
Mine own eyes find me foreign and appalling
Like some old ghost, some withered necromancer;
How long must I pipe on or play the dancer
In this unholy jest with phantoms brawling?
O day of my deliverance when this prison
Shall split, the rock burst and I stand up-risen,
Shedding this flesh so onerous and frail!
When from this dungeon night my soul sets sail,
An eagle cleaving leagues of wind and weather
To where my Lord and Lady walk together!