A DIRGE IN GRAY.

Larranagas! Thank you, thank you! Not a knife. I never use one— I've the right thing on my watch-chain Which some fool or other gave me— Takes the end off in a second— Sharp as life bites off our pleasures.

See! The soft wreath upward curling, Gray as mists in leaf-strewn hollows; Blue as skies in mild October; Vague, elusive as delight is. Ah! what shapes the smoke-wreaths grow to When they're looked at by a dreamer!

Waves that moan—cold, gray, and curling, On a shore where gray rocks break them; Skies where gray and blue are blended As our life blends joy and sorrow. Angel wings, and smoke of battles, Lines of beauty, curved perfection!

Half-shut eyes see many marvels; Gazed at through one's half-closed lashes Wreaths of smoke take shapes uncanny— Beckoning hands and warning fingers— But the gray cloud always somehow Ends by looking like a woman.

Like a woman tall and slender, Gowned in gray, with eyes like twilight, Soft, and dreamy, and delicious. Through my half-shut eyes I see her— Through my half-dead life am conscious Of her pure, perpetual presence.

Then the gray wreaths spread out broadly Till they make a level landscape, Toneless, dull, and very rainy— And an open grave—I saw it. Through the rain I heard the falling Of the tears the heart sheds inly.

Oh, I saw it! I remember Leafless branches, dripping, dripping, Through a chill not born of Autumn. To that grave tends all my dreaming— Oh, I saw it! I remember By that grave all dreaming ended!