A Shade upon the mind there passes As when on Noon A Cloud the mighty Sun encloses Remembering That some there be too numb to notice Oh God Why give if Thou must take away The Loved?
I've none to tell me to but Thee So when Thou failest, nobody - It was a little tie - It just held Two, nor those it held Since Somewhere thy sweet Face has spilled Beyond my Boundary - If things were opposite - and Me And Me it were - that ebbed from Thee On some unanswering Shore - Would'st Thou seek so - just say That I the Answer may pursue Unto the lips it eddied through - So - overtaking Thee.
The Bird must sing to earn the Crumb What merit have the Tune No Breakfast if it guaranty The Rose content may bloom To gain renown of Lady's Drawer But if the Lady come But once a Century, the Rose Superfluous become.
Each Second is the last Perhaps, recalls the Man Just measuring unconsciousness The Sea and Spar between - To fail within a Chance - How terribler a thing Than perish from the Chance's list Before the Perishing!
The Sun is gay or stark According to our Deed - If Merry, He is merrier - If eager for the Dead Or an expended Day He helped to make too bright His mighty pleasure suits Us not It magnifies our Freight.
Each Scar I'll keep for Him Instead I'll say of Gem In His long Absence worn A Costlier One But every Tear I bore Were He to count them o'er His own would fall so more I'll missum them.
It was a Grave - yet bore no Stone - Enclosed 'twas not - of Rail - A Consciousness - it's Acre - And It held a Human Soul - Entombed by whom - for what offence - If Home or foreign - born - Had I the Curiosity - 'Twere not appeased of Man -
Till Resurrection, I must guess - Denied the small desire A Rose upon it's Ridge - to sow - Or sacrificial Flower.
I stepped from Plank to Plank A slow and cautious way The Stars about my Head I felt About my Feet the Sea - I knew not but the next Would be my final inch - This gave me that precarious Gait Some call Experience.
They wont frown always - some sweet Day When I forget to teaze - They'll recollect how cold I looked And how I just said "Please". Then They will hasten to the Door To call the little Girl Who cannot thank Them for the Ice That filled the lisping full.
Ribbons of the Year - Multitude Brocade - Worn to Nature's Party once Then, as flung aside As a faded Bead Or a Wrinkled Pearl - Who shall charge the Vanity Of the Maker's Girl?