Had you been Sharer of that scene You would not ask while it bites in keen Why it is so We can no more go By the summer paths we used to know!
1913.
THE CLOCK OF THE YEARS
"A spirit passed before my face; the hair of my flesh stood up."And the Spirit said, "I can make the clock of the years go backward, But am loth to stop it where you will."And I cried, "Agreed To that. Proceed:
It's better than dead!"
He answered, "Peace";
And called her up--as last before me;
Then younger, younger she freshed, to the year I first had known Her woman-grown, And I cried, "Cease! -"Thus far is good -
It is enough--let her stay thus always!"
But alas for me. He shook his head:
No stop was there;
And she waned child-fair, And to babyhood.
Still less in mien To my great sorrow became she slowly, And smalled till she was nought at all In his checkless griff;And it was as if She had never been.
"Better," I plained, "She were dead as before! The memory of her Had lived in me; but it cannot now!"And coldly his voice:
"It was your choice To mar the ordained."1916.
AT THE PIANO
A woman was playing, A man looking on;
And the mould of her face, And her neck, and her hair, Which the rays fell upon Of the two candles there, Sent him mentally straying In some fancy-place Where pain had no trace.
A cowled Apparition Came pushing between;And her notes seemed to sigh, And the lights to burn pale, As a spell numbed the scene.
But the maid saw no bale, And the man no monition;And Time laughed awry, And the Phantom hid nigh.
THE SHADOW ON THE STONE
I went by the Druid stone That broods in the garden white and lone, And I stopped and looked at the shifting shadows That at some moments fall thereon From the tree hard by with a rhythmic swing, And they shaped in my imagining To the shade that a well-known head and shoulders Threw there when she was gardening.
I thought her behind my back, Yea, her I long had learned to lack, And I said: "I am sure you are standing behind me, Though how do you get into this old track?"And there was no sound but the fall of a leaf As a sad response; and to keep down grief I would not turn my head to discover That there was nothing in my belief.