Newspaper History presents media sourced from a United States newspaper dating back 108 years.

  • The Prisoner

    From The Washington Herald, April 20, 1914. By John Kendrick Bangs.

    I keep a special cell for pain
    Here in my brain
    And there,
    Dark days or fair,
    I let it lie forgotten and alone
    To feed on its own moan;
    And then, when all its power to sting is gone,
    I open the door of memory again
    And let it pass along the road
    To some less chill abode;
    And strange to say,
    Sometimes when poor old pain has gone away,
    I find, long after his retreat,
    The later memory of him is sweet,
    And in my soul a greater strength appears
    For that I once in days that were
    Held Pain a Prisoner.