I sang that song on Sunday, To witch an idle while, I sang that song on Monday, As fittest to beguile; I sang it as the year outwore, And the new slid in; I thought not what might shape before Another would begin.
I sang that song in summer, All unforeknowingly, To him as a new-comer From regions strange to me: I sang it when in afteryears The shades stretched out, And paths were faint; and flocking fears Brought cup-eyed care and doubt.
Sings he that song on Sundays In some dim land afar, On Sat.u.r.days, or Mondays, As when the evening star Glimpsed in upon his bending face And my hanging hair, And time untouched me with a trace Of soul-smart or despair?
A WET AUGUST
Nine drops of water bead the jessamine, And nine-and-ninety smear the stones and tiles: - "Twas not so in that August--full-rayed, fine-- When we lived out-of-doors, sang songs, strode miles.
Or was there then no noted radiancy Of summer? Were dun clouds, a dribbling bough, Gilt over by the light I bore in me, And was the waste world just the same as now?
It can have been so: yea, that threatenings Of coming down-drip on the sunless gray, By the then possibilities in things Were wrought more bright than brightest skies to-day.
1920.
THE DISSEMBLERS
"It was not you I came to please, Only myself," flipped she; "I like this spot of phantasies, And thought you far from me."
But O, he was the secret spell That led her to the lea!
"It was not she who shaped my ways, Or works, or thoughts," he said.
"I scarcely marked her living days, Or missed her much when dead."
But O, his joyance knew its knell When daisies hid her head!
TO A LADY PLAYING AND SINGING IN THE MORNING
Joyful lady, sing!
And I will lurk here listening, Though nought be done, and nought begun, And work-hours swift are scurrying.
Sing, O lady, still!
Aye, I will wait each note you trill, Though duties due that press to do This whole day long I unfulfil.
"--It is an evening tune; One not designed to waste the noon,"
You say. I know: time bids me go-- For daytide pa.s.ses too, too soon!
But let indulgence be, This once, to my rash ecstasy: When sounds nowhere that carolled air My idled morn may comfort me!
"A MAN WAS DRAWING NEAR TO ME"
On that gray night of mournful drone, A part from aught to hear, to see, I dreamt not that from shires unknown In gloom, alone, By Halworthy, A man was drawing near to me.
I"d no concern at anything, No sense of coming pull-heart play; Yet, under the silent outspreading Of even"s wing Where Otterham lay, A man was riding up my way.
I thought of n.o.body--not of one, But only of trifles--legends, ghosts-- Though, on the moorland dim and dun That travellers shun About these coasts, The man had pa.s.sed Tresparret Posts.
There was no light at all inland, Only the seaward pharos-fire, Nothing to let me understand That hard at hand By Hennett Byre The man was getting nigh and nigher.
There was a rumble at the door, A draught disturbed the drapery, And but a minute pa.s.sed before, With gaze that bore My destiny, The man revealed himself to me.
THE STRANGE HOUSE (MAX GATE, A.D. 2000)
"I hear the piano playing-- Just as a ghost might play."
"--O, but what are you saying?
There"s no piano to-day; Their old one was sold and broken; Years past it went amiss."
"--I heard it, or shouldn"t have spoken: A strange house, this!
"I catch some undertone here, From some one out of sight."
"--Impossible; we are alone here, And shall be through the night."
"--The parlour-door--what stirred it?"
"--No one: no soul"s in range."
"--But, anyhow, I heard it, And it seems strange!
"Seek my own room I cannot-- A figure is on the stair!"
"--What figure? Nay, I scan not Any one lingering there.
A bough outside is waving, And that"s its shade by the moon."
"--Well, all is strange! I am craving Strength to leave soon."
"--Ah, maybe you"ve some vision Of showings beyond our sphere; Some sight, sense, intuition Of what once happened here?
The house is old; they"ve hinted It once held two love-thralls, And they may have imprinted Their dreams on its walls?
"They were--I think "twas told me-- Queer in their works and ways; The teller would often hold me With weird tales of those days.
Some folk can not abide here, But we--we do not care Who loved, laughed, wept, or died here, Knew joy, or despair."
"AS "TWERE TO-NIGHT"
(SONG)