In the Room by James Thomson.

Part 4 of 13.

It is so many hours

ago—
The lamp and fire were both alight—
I saw him pacing to and fro,
Perturbing restlessly the night.
His face was pale to give one fear,
His eyes when lifted looked too bright;
He mutter’d; what, I could not hear:
Bad words though; something was not right.

The table said, He wrote so long
That I grew weary of his weight;
The pen kept up a cricket song,
It ran and ran at such a rate:
And in the longer pauses he
With both his folded arms downpress’d
And stared as one who does not see,
Or sank his head upon his breast.