Sonnet XIV

Ingratitude, how deadly is thy smart

Proceeding from the Form we fondly love!

How light, compared, all other sorrows prove!

Thou shed'st a Night of Woe, from whence depart

The gentle beams of Patience, that the heart

'Mid lesser ills, illume.—Thy Victims rove

Unquiet as the Ghost that haunts the Grove

Where Murder spilt the life-blood.—O! thy dart

Kills more than Life,—e'en all that makes Life dear;

Till we “the sensible of pain” wou'd change

For Phrenzy, that defies the bitter tear;

Or wish, in kindred callousness, to range

Where moon-ey'd Idiocy, with fallen lip,

Drags the loose knee, and intermitting step.