Time's Laughingstocks, and Other Verses Part 5

Next day the child fled us; And nevermore sighted was even A print of his shoe.

Thenceforward she shunned me, and languished; Till one day the park-pool Embraced her fair form, and extinguished Her eyes' living blue.

- So; ask not what blast may account for This aspect of pallor, These bones that just prison within them Life's poor residue;

But pa.s.s by, and leave unregarded A Cain to his suffering, For vengeance too dark on the woman Whose lover he slew.

THE REJECTED MEMBER'S WIFE

We shall see her no more On the balcony, Smiling, while hurt, at the roar As of surging sea From the stormy st.u.r.dy band Who have doomed her lord's cause, Though she waves her little hand As it were applause.

Here will be candidates yet, And candidates' wives, Fervid with zeal to set Their ideals on our lives: Here will come market-men On the market-days, Here will clash now and then More such party a.s.says.

And the balcony will fill When such times are renewed, And the throng in the street will thrill With to-day's mettled mood; But she will no more stand In the sunshine there, With that wave of her white-gloved hand, And that chestnut hair.

January 1906.

THE FARM-WOMAN'S WINTER

I

If seasons all were summers, And leaves would never fall, And hopping cas.e.m.e.nt-comers Were foodless not at all, And fragile folk might be here That white winds bid depart; Then one I used to see here Would warm my wasted heart!

II

One frail, who, bravely tilling Long hours in gripping gusts, Was mastered by their chilling, And now his ploughshare rusts.

So savage winter catches The breath of limber things, And what I love he s.n.a.t.c.hes, And what I love not, brings.

AUTUMN IN KING'S HINTOCK PARK

Here by the baring bough Raking up leaves, Often I ponder how Springtime deceives, - I, an old woman now, Raking up leaves.

Here in the avenue Raking up leaves, Lords' ladies pa.s.s in view, Until one heaves Sighs at life's russet hue, Raking up leaves!

Just as my shape you see Raking up leaves, I saw, when fresh and free, Those memory weaves Into grey ghosts by me, Raking up leaves.

Yet, Dear, though one may sigh, Raking up leaves, New leaves will dance on high - Earth never grieves! - Will not, when missed am I Raking up leaves.

1901.

SHUT OUT THAT MOON

Close up the cas.e.m.e.nt, draw the blind, Shut out that stealing moon, She wears too much the guise she wore Before our lutes were strewn With years-deep dust, and names we read On a white stone were hewn.

Step not out on the dew-dashed lawn To view the Lady's Chair, Immense Orion's glittering form, The Less and Greater Bear: Stay in; to such sights we were drawn When faded ones were fair.

Brush not the bough for midnight scents That come forth lingeringly, And wake the same sweet sentiments They breathed to you and me When living seemed a laugh, and love All it was said to be.

Within the common lamp-lit room Prison my eyes and thought; Let dingy details crudely loom, Mechanic speech be wrought: Too fragrant was Life's early bloom, Too tart the fruit it brought!

1904.

REMINISCENCES OF A DANCING MAN

I

Who now remembers Almack's b.a.l.l.s - Willis's sometime named - In those two smooth-floored upper halls For faded ones so famed?

Where as we trod to trilling sound The fancied phantoms stood around, Or joined us in the maze, Of the powdered Dears from Georgian years, Whose dust lay in sightless sealed-up biers, The fairest of former days.

II

Who now remembers gay Cremorne, And all its jaunty jills, And those wild whirling figures born Of Jullien's grand quadrilles?

With hats on head and morning coats There footed to his prancing notes Our partner-girls and we; And the gas-jets winked, and the l.u.s.tres clinked, And the platform throbbed as with arms enlinked We moved to the minstrelsy.

III

Who now recalls those crowded rooms Of old yclept "The Argyle,"

Where to the deep Drum-polka's booms We hopped in standard style?

Whither have danced those damsels now!

Is Death the partner who doth moue Their wormy chaps and bare?

Do their spectres spin like sparks within The smoky halls of the Prince of Sin To a thunderous Jullien air?

THE DEAD MAN WALKING

They hail me as one living, But don't they know That I have died of late years, Untombed although?