A dark extract from ‘Child Harold’

My life hath been one love—no blot it out

My life hath been one chain of contradictions


Madhouses Prisons wh---re shops—never doubt


But that my life hath had some strong convictions

That such was wrong—religion makes restrictions

I would have followed—but life turned a bubble


& clumb the jiant stile of maledictions


They took me from my wife & to save trouble


I wed again & made the error double


Yet abscence claims them both & keeps them too

& locks me in a shop in spite of law


Among a low lived set & dirty crew


Here let the Muse oblivions curtain draw


& let man think—for God hath often saw


Things here too dirty for the light of day


For in a madhouse there exists no law—


Now stagnant grows my too refined clay
I envy birds their wings to flue away

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