The Sigh

Little head against my shoulder,

Shy at first, then somewhat bolder,

And up-eyed;

Till she, with a timid quaver,

Yielded to the kiss I gave her;

But, she sighed.

That there mingled with her feeling

Some sad thought she was concealing

It implied.

- Not that she had ceased to love me,

None on earth she set above me;

But she sighed.

She could not disguise a passion,

Dread, or doubt, in weakest fashion

If she tried:

Nothing seemed to hold us sundered,

Hearts were victors; so I wondered

Why she sighed.

Afterwards I knew her throughly,

And she loved me staunchly, truly,

Till she died;

But she never made confession

Why, at that first sweet concession,

She had sighed.

It was in our May, remember;

And though now I near November,

And abide

Till my appointed change, unfretting,

Sometimes I sit half regretting

That she sighed.

-o0o-

One We Knew

She told how they used to form for the country dances -

"The Triumph," "The New-rigged Ship" -

To the light of the guttering wax in the panelled manses,

And in cots to the blink of a dip.

She spoke of the wild "poussetting" and "allemanding"

On carpet, on oak, and on sod;

And the two long rows of ladies and gentlemen standing,

And the figures the couples trod.

She showed us the spot where the maypole was yearly planted,

And where the bandsmen stood

While breeched and kerchiefed partners whirled, and panted

To choose each other for good.

She told of that far-back day when they learnt astounded

Of the death of the King of France:

Of the Terror; and then of Bonaparte's unbounded

Ambition and arrogance.

Of how his threats woke warlike preparations

Along the southern strand,

And how each night brought tremors and trepidations

Lest morning should see him land.

She said she had often heard the gibbet creaking

As it swayed in the lightning flash,

Had caught from the neighbouring town a small child's shrieking

At the cart-tail under the lash . . .

With cap-framed face and long gaze into the embers -

We seated around her knees -

She would dwell on such dead themes, not as one who remembers,

But rather as one who sees.

She seemed one left behind of a band gone distant

So far that no tongue could hail:

Past things retold were to her as things existent,

Things present but as a tale.

-o0o-

At Lulworth Cove a Century Back

Had I but lived a hundred years ago 

I might have gone, as I have gone this year, 

By Warmwell Cross on to a Cove I know, 

And Time have placed his finger on me there: 

"You see that man?" — I might have looked, and said, 

"O yes: I see him. One that boat has brought 

Which dropped down Channel round Saint Alban's Head. 

So commonplace a youth calls not my thought." 

"You see that man?" — "Why yes; I told you; yes: 

Of an idling town-sort; thin; hair brown in hue; 

And as the evening light scants less and less 

He looks up at a star, as many do." 

"You see that man?" — "Nay, leave me!" then I plead, 

"I have fifteen miles to vamp across the lea, 

And it grows dark, and I am weary-kneed: 

I have said the third time; yes, that man I see!" 

"Good. That man goes to Rome — to death, despair; 

And no one notes him now but you and I: 

A hundred years, and the world will follow him there, 

And bend with reverence where his ashes lie." 

-o0o-

In The Vaulted Way

In the vaulted way, where the passage turned

To the shadowy corner that none could see,

You paused for our parting, - plaintively;

Though overnight had come words that burned

My fond frail happiness out of me.

And then I kissed you, - despite my thought

That our spell must end when reflection came

On what you had deemed me, whose one long aim

Had been to serve you; that what I sought

Lay not in a heart that could breathe such blame.

But yet I kissed you; whereon you again

As of old kissed me. Why, why was it so?

Do you cleave to me after that light-tongued blow?

If you scorned me at eventide, how love then?

The thing is dark, Dear. I do not know.

-o0o-

Welcome Home

To my native place

Bent upon returning,

Bosom all day burning

To be where my race

Well were known, 'twas much with me

There to dwell in amity.

Folk had sought their beds,

But I hailed: to view me

Under the moon, out to me

Several pushed their heads,

And to each I told my name,

Plans, and that therefrom I came.

"Did you? . . . Ah, 'tis true

I once heard, back a long time,

Here had spent his young time,

Some such man as you . . .

Good-night." The casement closed again,

And I was left in the frosty lane.

-o0o-

In The Days Of Crinoline

A plain tilt-bonnet on her head

She took the path across the leaze.

- Her spouse the vicar, gardening, said,

"Too dowdy that, for coquetries,

So I can hoe at ease."

But when she had passed into the heath,

And gained the wood beyond the flat,

She raised her skirts, and from beneath

Unpinned and drew as from a sheath

An ostrich-feathered hat.

And where the hat had hung she now

Concealed and pinned the dowdy hood,

And set the hat upon her brow,

And thus emerging from the wood

Tripped on in jaunty mood.

The sun was low and crimson-faced

As two came that way from the town,

And plunged into the wood untraced . . .

When separately therefrom they paced

The sun had quite gone down.

The hat and feather disappeared,

The dowdy hood again was donned,

And in the gloom the fair one neared

Her home and husband dour, who conned

Calmly his blue-eyed blonde.

"To-day," he said, "you have shown good sense,

A dress so modest and so meek

Should always deck your goings hence

Alone." And as a recompense

He kissed her on the cheek.

-o0o-

In A Eweleaze Near Weatherbury

The years have gathered grayly

Since I danced upon this leaze

With one who kindled gaily

Love's fitful ecstasies!

But despite the term as teacher,

I remain what I was then

In each essential feature

Of the fantasies of men.

Yet I note the little chisel

Of never-napping Time,

Defacing ghast and grizzel

The blazon of my prime.

When at night he thinks me sleeping,

I feel him boring sly

Within my bones, and heaping

Quaintest pains for by-and-by.

Still, I'd go the world with Beauty,

I would laugh with her and sing,

I would shun divinest duty

To resume her worshipping.

But she'd scorn my brave endeavour,

She would not balm the breeze

By murmuring "Thine for ever!"

As she did upon this leaze.

-o0o-