Part 66

My paradise, the fame That they pronounce my name.

XXVII.

INVISIBLE.

From us she wandered now a year, Her tarrying unknown; If wilderness prevent her feet, Or that ethereal zone

No eye hath seen and lived, We ignorant must be. We only know what time of year We took the mystery.

XXVIII.

I wish I knew that woman's name, So, when she comes this way, To hold my life, and hold my ears, For fear I hear her say

She's 'sorry I am dead,' again, Just when the grave and I Have sobbed ourselves almost to sleep, -- Our only lullaby.

XXIX.

TRYING TO FORGET.

Bereaved of all, I went abroad, No less bereaved to be Upon a new peninsula, -- The grave preceded me,

Obtained my lodgings ere myself, And when I sought my bed, The grave it was, reposed upon The pillow for my head.

I waked, to find it first awake, I rose, -- it followed me; I tried to drop it in the crowd, To lose it in the sea,

In cups of artificial drowse To sleep its shape away, -- The grave was finished, but the spade Remained in memory.

XXX.

I felt a funeral in my brain, And mourners, to and fro, Kept treading, treading, till it seemed That sense was breaking through.

And when they all were seated, A service like a drum Kept beating, beating, till I thought My mind was going numb.

And then I heard them lift a box, And creak across my soul With those same boots of lead, again. Then space began to toll

As all the heavens were a bell, And Being but an ear, And I and silence some strange race, Wrecked, solitary, here.

XXXI.

I meant to find her when I came; Death had the same design; But the success was his, it seems, And the discomfit mine.

I meant to tell her how I longed For just this single time; But Death had told her so the first, And she had hearkened him.

To wander now is my abode; To rest, -- to rest would be A privilege of hurricane To memory and me.

XXXII.

WAITING.

I sing to use the waiting, My bonnet but to tie, And shut the door unto my house; No more to do have I,

Till, his best step approaching, We journey to the day, And tell each other how we sang To keep the dark away.

XXXIII.