Pour ye a wail of the wildest
E'er wrung from a worn heart and mind!
Tears and entreaties the mildest
Are blown like the chaff on the wind!
Speak through a trumpet of thunder,
The drunkard is deaf to the call;
Words of deep sorrow and wonder,
Unheeded, uncared for, may fall!
Woe for the heart-stricken mother,
Sinking in terror and shame
From scenes that she vainly would smother-
The curse of her house and her name!
Woe to the grey, stooping father-
The blossoms of love and of trust
He hoped of his children to gather,
Are withered and gone up like dust!
Woe for the drunkard-all feelings
Of manhood and duty are gone!
List to his horrid revealings,
When Reason lies drowned on her throne!
Horrors, deep, direful, are rushing
Through the dark 'wildered cells of his brain;
Despair fiercely rending and crushing
Each nerve and each hot throbbing vein!
Woe to the fiend-haunted dwelling
Where the demon of drink hath abode!
No Psalm, even or morning, is swelling,
But curses of man and of God!
His heaven and his hell are in drinking;
'Tis bliss when his raging desires
He is glutting; his hell is in thinking,
Sublimed in Eternity's fires!