The Prisoner for Debt

When the summer sun was in the west,
Its crimson radiance fell,
Some on the blue and changeful sea,
And some in the prisoner's cell.
And then his eye with a smile would beam,
And the blood would leave his brain,
And the verdure of his soul return,
Like sere grass after rain!
But when the tempest wreathed and spread
A mantle o'er the sun,
He gather'd back his woes again,
And brooded thereupon;
And thus he lived, till Time one day
Led Death to break his chain:
And then the prisoner went away,
And he was free again!