Vii

THERE’S a regret So grinding, so immitigably sad, Remorse thereby feels tolerant, even glad . . . Do you not know it yet?

For deeds undone Rankle and snarl and hunger for their due, Till there seems naught so despicable as you In all the grin o’ the sun.

Like an old shoe The sea spurns and the land abhors, you lie About the beach of Time, till by and by Death, that derides you too—

Death, as he goes His ragman’s round, espies you, where you stray, With half-an-eye, and kicks you out of his way; And then—and then, who knows

But the kind Grave Turns on you, and you feel the convict Worm, In that black bridewell working out his term, Hanker and grope and crave?

‘Poor fool that might— That might, yet would not, dared not, let this be, Think of it, here and thus made over to me In the implacable night!’

And writhing, fain And like a triumphing lover, he shall take His fill where no high memory lives to make His obscene victory vain.

VIII To A. J. H.

TIME and the Earth— The old Father and Mother— Their teeming accomplished, Their purpose fulfilled, Close with a smile For a moment of kindness, Ere for the winter They settle to sleep.

Failing yet gracious, Slow pacing, soon homing, A patriarch that strolls Through the tents of his children, The Sun, as he journeys His round on the lower Ascents of the blue, Washes the roofs And the hillsides with clarity; Charms the dark pools Till they break into pictures; Scatters magnificent Alms to the beggar trees; Touches the mist-folk, That crowd to his escort, Into translucencies Radiant and ravishing: As with the visible Spirit of Summer Gloriously vaporised, Visioned in gold!

Love, though the fallen leaf Mark, and the fleeting light And the loud, loitering Footfall of darkness Sign to the heart Of the passage of destiny, Here is the ghost Of a summer that lived for us, Here is a promise Of summers to be.