As "twere to-night, in the brief s.p.a.ce Of a far eventime, My spirit rang achime At vision of a girl of grace; As "twere to-night, in the brief s.p.a.ce Of a far eventime.
As "twere at noontide of to-morrow I airily walked and talked, And wondered as I walked What it could mean, this soar from sorrow; As "twere at noontide of to-morrow I airily walked and talked.
As "twere at waning of this week Broke a new life on me; Trancings of bliss to be In some dim dear land soon to seek; As "twere at waning of this week Broke a new life on me!
THE CONTRETEMPS
A forward rush by the lamp in the gloom, And we clasped, and almost kissed; But she was not the woman whom I had promised to meet in the thawing brume On that harbour-bridge; nor was I he of her tryst.
So loosening from me swift she said: "O why, why feign to be The one I had meant!--to whom I have sped To fly with, being so sorrily wed!"
- "Twas thus and thus that she upbraided me.
My a.s.signation had struck upon Some others" like it, I found.
And her lover rose on the night anon; And then her husband entered on The lamplit, snowflaked, sloppiness around.
"Take her and welcome, man!" he cried: "I wash my hands of her.
I"ll find me twice as good a bride!"
--All this to me, whom he had eyed, Plainly, as his wife"s planned deliverer.
And next the lover: "Little I knew, Madam, you had a third!
Kissing here in my very view!"
--Husband and lover then withdrew.
I let them; and I told them not they erred.
Why not? Well, there faced she and I-- Two strangers who"d kissed, or near, Chancewise. To see stand weeping by A woman once embraced, will try The tension of a man the most austere.
So it began; and I was young, She pretty, by the lamp, As flakes came waltzing down among The waves of her clinging hair, that hung Heavily on her temples, dark and damp.
And there alone still stood we two; She one cast off for me, Or so it seemed: while night ondrew, Forcing a parley what should do We twain hearts caught in one catastrophe.
In stranded souls a common strait Wakes latencies unknown, Whose impulse may precipitate A life-long leap. The hour was late, And there was the Jersey boat with its funnel agroan.
"Is wary walking worth much pother?"
It grunted, as still it stayed.
"One pairing is as good as another Where all is venture! Take each other, And sc.r.a.p the oaths that you have aforetime made." . . .
--Of the four involved there walks but one On earth at this late day.
And what of the chapter so begun?
In that odd complex what was done?
Well; happiness comes in full to none: Let peace lie on lulled lips: I will not say.
WEYMOUTH.
A GENTLEMAN"S EPITAPH ON HIMSELF AND A LADY, WHO WERE BURIED TOGETHER
I dwelt in the shade of a city, She far by the sea, With folk perhaps good, gracious, witty; But never with me.
Her form on the ballroom"s smooth flooring I never once met, To guide her with accents adoring Through Weippert"s "First Set." {1}
I spent my life"s seasons with pale ones In Vanity Fair, And she enjoyed hers among hale ones In salt-smelling air.
Maybe she had eyes of deep colour, Maybe they were blue, Maybe as she aged they got duller; That never I knew.
She may have had lips like the coral, But I never kissed them, Saw pouting, nor curling in quarrel, Nor sought for, nor missed them.
Not a word pa.s.sed of love all our lifetime, Between us, nor thrill; We"d never a husband-and-wife time, For good or for ill.
Yet as one dust, through bleak days and vernal, Lie I and lies she, This never-known lady, eternal Companion to me!
THE OLD GOWN (SONG)
I have seen her in gowns the brightest, Of azure, green, and red, And in the simplest, whitest, Muslined from heel to head; I have watched her walking, riding, Shade-flecked by a leafy tree, Or in fixed thought abiding By the foam-fingered sea.
In woodlands I have known her, When boughs were mourning loud, In the rain-reek she has shown her Wild-haired and watery-browed.
And once or twice she has cast me As she pomped along the street Court-clad, ere quite she had pa.s.sed me, A glance from her chariot-seat.
But in my memoried pa.s.sion For evermore stands she In the gown of fading fashion She wore that night when we, Doomed long to part, a.s.sembled In the snug small room; yea, when She sang with lips that trembled, "Shall I see his face again?"
A NIGHT IN NOVEMBER
I marked when the weather changed, And the panes began to quake, And the winds rose up and ranged, That night, lying half-awake.
Dead leaves blew into my room, And alighted upon my bed, And a tree declared to the gloom Its sorrow that they were shed.
One leaf of them touched my hand, And I thought that it was you There stood as you used to stand, And saying at last you knew!
(?) 1913.
A DUETTIST TO HER PIANOFORTE SONG OF SILENCE (E. L. H.--H. C. H.)