Коутс Кинни (Coates Kinney)

The Haunting Voice

The voice of a woman forever
  Runs sobbing after my soul;
Night or day, day or night, I can never
  Escape its mournful control;
  Its moaning musical dole
Pursues me for ever and ever.

It comes to my memory mingling
  With words it uttered of yore,
When its tones through my pulses went tingling
  With thrills felt never before—
  With thrills felt now nevermore,
Not even in home’s holy mingling.

Says the sorrowful voice, ‘O! my darling,
  Did love that being endow
Whose prattle outcarols the starling
  And makes home happier now?
  You took the marital vow,
And you gave me to die, O, my darling!’

So forever this voice of a woman
  Cries desolately to me—
This voice as really human
  As voice of human can be!
  No matter whither I flee,
Still I hear this voice of a woman.

Down to death and the sepulcher’s portal
  This voice shall follow my sin—
O, what if the voice is immortal,
  And, where hope’s blisses begin,
  Shall come and welcome me in
With joy through the heavenly portal!