THE SICK MAN’S GARDEN

He has been ill so long On whom it depended, That the garden untended Is beginning to go wrong. The gate has fallen awry, The tools are half rusted— They will be encrusted All over, by and by. The rose has broken loose From the arch where he trained it; Dead petal on petal has stained it With its own juice. Walks and plots are unkempt— It is all dishevelled; Like a skein unravelled, Like a forgotten thing dream’d. And peering through the gate, And closing in around it, The thickets that bound it Seem to be lying in wait. My heart foretells the day Toward which it moulders, When men with bowed shoulders Shall carry him away. Herb-border and flower-bed Underfoot they shall trample, And briar and bramble Make slower their slow tread. The mourners as they pass Will stumble and shuffle, Their steps shall be muffled With the swishing of long grass. Departed the last black form And the last black shadow, From thicket and meadow Shall clamber in a swarm Of wildings and weeds out-cast, By exile eagered For the garden beleaguered Which has fallen to them at last. By these remorseless, dumb Spoilers invaded, The flowers unaided Shall all be overcome; Save only those at need’s Touch who turn traitors, Changing their natures And reverting again to weeds. Thus shall wild earth be paid The debt so long owing; Whilst he, unknowing, Deep in wild earth is laid.