Dim apprehension of a trust
Comes over me this quiet hour,
As though the silence were a flower,
And this, its perfume, dark like dust.

My individual self would cling
Through fear, through pride, unto its fears:
It strives to shut out what it hears,
The founts of being murmuring.

O! Need, whose hauntings terrorize;
Whether my maiden ways would hide,
Or lose and to that need subside,
Life shrinks and instinct dreads surprise.