Death & Dying
The One Lost
From Poems (1922)
I mingle with your bones;
You steal in subtle noose
This lighted dust Jehovah loans
And now I lose.
What will the Lender say
When I shall not be found,
Safe-sheltered at the Judgment Day,
Being in you bound?
He’ll hunt through wards of Heaven,
Call to uncoffined earth
“Where is this soul, unjudged, not given
Dole for good’s dearth?”
And I, lying so safe
Within you, hearing all,
To have cheated God shall laugh,
Freed by your thrall.
Codex Note
'I mingle with your bones': a love-and-death poem in which the speaker, loaned this 'lighted dust' by Jehovah, claims to have cheated God. First printed posthumously in Voices, 1921.
Cite this poem
MLA
Rosenberg, Isaac. “The One Lost.” Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/rosenberg/27/.
Chicago
Rosenberg, Isaac. “The One Lost.” Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/rosenberg/27/.
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