PART V.

Vased in her bedroom window, white As her glad girlhood, never lost, I smelt the roses; and the night Outside was fog and frost. What though I claimed her dying there! God nor one angel understood Nor cared, who from loved feet to hair Had changed to mist her blood. Love, love had claimed us long, and long Our hearts sang harp-strung, late and soon; But God!—God jangles thus the song And makes discord of tune. What lily lilier than her face! More virgin than her lips I kissed! When morn like God, with gold and grace Broke massed in mist! broke massed in mist!

Love, to your face farewell now, Pillowed a flower on flowers; Eyes, white-weighed with a spell now; Lips, with nothing to tell now, That bade adieu to ours. Dear, is your soul so daggered There by a world that hates? Love—is he ever laggard? Hope—is her face so haggard? You, who are one with the Fates? Never to wait to-morrow Under such worldly skies! Never to sleep with sorrow! Hour by hour to borrow Joy that has only sighs! Sweet, farewell forever; And a burning tear or two— Will they reach your knowledge ever, And touch through the dreams that sever My life from the life of you? O Life, in my flesh so fearful Medicine me this pain! Thy eyes with a science cheerful, But mine, with a mystery tearful, Tearful and slumber-fain. Love, to your lips farewell now— Your spirit through them I kiss; Lips—so sealed with a spell now! Lips, with nothing to tell now But this! but this! but this!...

So long it seems since last I saw her face, So long ago it seems, Like some sad soul, in unconjectured space, Lost in the happiness of some dead grace Remembered—I. And, oh! a little while The sorrow stabs and Death conceals no smile From Love bowed weeping in a thorny place— So long ago, our love is what are dreams! Since she is gone no more I feel the light, Since she is gone beyond, Burst like a revelation out of night,— Golden convictions of far futures bright,— Whiles clouds around the west take marble tones; For Hope sits sighing in a place of stones, Dark locks dishevelled and face very white,— Since she is gone and life's an iron bond. Now she is dead the doubt Love dulled with awe, Now she is dead to me, Questions the wisdom of diviner law. Self-solved of self I search to find a flaw— O egotism of Earth's fools and slaves!— For Faith leans thoughtful in a place of graves, On that unseen from this seen known to draw, Now she is dead and it is hard to see.

Ridged and bleak the gray forsaken Twilight at the night has guessed, Where no star of dusk has taken Flame unshaken in the west. All the day the woodlands dying Moaned, and drippings as of grief Tossed from barren boughs with sighing Death of flying twig and leaf. Ah, to be a dream unbroken, Past the ironies of Fate! Born a tree; with branches oaken Dear unspoken intimate. Who may say that man has never Lived the mighty hearts of trees? Graduating Godward ever, The Forever finds through these? Colors, we have lived, are cherished; Odors, we have been, are ours; Entity alone has perished; Beauty-nourished souls were flowers. Music, when the fancy guesses, Lifts us loftier thoughts among; Spirit that the flesh distresses, But expresses self with song.... Heaven in darkness bends upbraiding Without moonlight, without star; Darkness and the reason aiding, All but fading phantoms are. Still philosophy is saying: "Now that hope with life seems gone, Some are cursing, some are praying, God smiles raying in the dawn!"

Wild weather; the whip of the sleet On the shuttered casement tapping; A shadow from face to feet, Like a shroud, my spirit wrapping, Wild weather; and how is she Now the sting of the storm beats serried, Over the stone and the tree Of the grave where she is buried? Wild weather; I cannot weep— But the skies weep on and worry; So I sleep, and dream in my sleep How I hear dim garments hurry.... Star weather and footsteps of stars; And I see white raiment glisten, Like the glow on the face of Mars When the stars to the angels listen. And with me I see how she stands With lips high thought has weighted; With testifying hands, And eyes with purity mated. Have I spoken and have I kneeled To the prayer I worship, I wonder?— What waits on her lips that are sealed? God-sealed and who shall sunder! I sob, "Oh your stay was long! You are come, but your feet were laggard, With mansuetude and song For a heart your death has daggered." And I lift wet eyes to her Unutterable with weeping, And beg for the loves that were, Now passed into Heaven's keeping.... I wake and a clock tolls three— And the night and the storm lie serried On the testament that's she, Closed, clasped, and forever buried.

The night is shrewd with storm and sleet; Each loose-warped casement raps or groans; I hear the wailing woodland beat The tempest with long blatant moans, Like one who fears defeat. And sitting here beyond the storm, Alone within the lonely house, It seems of Sleep the Fairy charm Weaves incantations; even the mouse That scratched has come to harm. And in this grave light, stolen o'er Familiar objects, grown severe, I 'm strange—as, opening a door, One finds one's dead self standing near, One knew not dead before. The old stair rings with growling gusts; Each hearth's flue gasps a gorgon throat That snores and sleeps; the spectral dusts, Which yonder Shawnee war-gear coat, Whose quiver hangs and rusts, Are shaken; till I feel that he, Who wore it in the wild war-dance, And died in it, fills shadowy Its wampumed skins; its plume, perchance, Shakes, scowling eyes at me. And so the Swedenborge I toss Aside, contented with the dark That takes me. O'er the fire-light cross; Pass where the andirons spit and spark, And ponder o'er her loss. Or from the flaw-splashed window yearn Out toward the waste, where sway and dip Dank, dark December boughs, where burn Some late last leaves, that icy drip No matter where you turn. Where sodden soil, you scarce have trod, Fills oozy footprints; and the night So ugly that it mocks at God, Creating monsters which the sight Fancies, unseen, abroad. The months I count: how long it seems Since that bland summer when with her, There on her porch, in rainy gleams We watched the mellow lightning stir In rain-clouds gray as dreams! When all the west a torn gold sheet— Swift openings of some Titan's forge— Laid bald with storm; in quivering heat Pitched precipice and nightmare gorge, Where thunder torrents beat. And strong the wind was as again Storm lit the instant earth; and how The wood sprang out one virent stain; We read no more—lost is it now!— In Romance of a Reign; A tale of nowhere; then that we Were reading till we heard the plunge Of distant thunder sullenly, And left to mark long lightnings lunge Convulsions fiery. What worlds love wrought us, dreaming there, Of sorcery and necromance! With spirits lustrous of the air, A land like one great pearl, a trance Of floods and forests fair. Where white-faced flowers sang and thought; Where fragrant birds flew, brilliant-blown, In winging odors; feather-fraught With light, where breathing colors shone, On throbbing music brought. Or built us some snug country home Among the hills; with terraces Vine-hung and orchared o'er the foam Of the Ohio, far one sees Wind crimson in the gloam. And this! and this!—alone! alone! To hear the sweep of winter rain, The missiled sleet's sharp arrows blown; Dark shadow on the freezing pane, And on my heart a moan!