A Hidden Life and Other Poems Part 4

An' aboon, there's room for mony-- 'Twas na made for ane or twa; But it grew for a' an' ony Countin' love the best ava'.

Here, aneath, I ca' ye father: Auld names we'll nor tyne nor spare; A' my sons.h.i.+p I maun gather, For the Son is King up there.

Greetna, father, that I'm gaein'; For ye ken fu' weel the gaet: Here, in winter, cast yer sawin'-- There, in hairst, again ye hae't.

What of the lady? Little more I know.

Not even if, when she had read the lines, She rose in haste, and to her chamber went, And shut the door; nor if, when she came forth, A dawn of holier purpose shone across The sadness of her brow; unto herself Convicted; though the great world, knowing all, Might call her pure as day--yea, truth itself.

Of these things I know nothing--only know That on a warm autumnal afternoon, When half-length shadows fell from mossy stones, Darkening the green upon the gra.s.sy graves, While the still church, like a said prayer, arose White in the suns.h.i.+ne, silent as the graves, Empty of souls, as is the tomb itself; A little boy, who watched a cow near by Gather her milk from alms of clover fields, Flung over earthen d.y.k.es, or straying out Beneath the gates upon the paths, beheld All suddenly--he knew not how she came-- A lady, closely veiled, alone, and still, Seated upon a grave. Long time she sat And moved not, "greetin' sair," the boy did say; "Just like my mither whan my father deed.

An' syne she rase, an' pu'd at something sma', A glintin' gowan, or maybe a blade O' the dead gra.s.s," and glided silent forth, Over the low stone wall by two old steps, And round the corner, and was seen no more.

The clang of hoofs and sound of carriage wheels Arose and died upon the listener's ear.

THE HOMELESS GHOST.

Still flowed the music, flowed the wine.

The youth in silence went; Through naked streets, in cold moons.h.i.+ne, His homeward way he bent, Where, on the city's seaward line, His lattice seaward leant.

He knew not why he left the throng, But that he could not rest; That something pained him in the song, And mocked him in the jest; And a cold moon-glitter lay along One lovely lady's breast.

He sat him down with solemn book His sadness to beguile; A skull from off its bracket-nook Threw him a lipless smile; But its awful, laughter-mocking look, Was a pa.s.sing moonbeam's wile.

An hour he sat, and read in vain, Nought but mirrors were his eyes; For to and fro through his helpless brain, Went the dance's mysteries; Till a gust of wind against the pane, Mixed with a sea-bird's cries, And the sudden spatter of drifting rain Bade him mark the altered skies.

The moon was gone, intombed in cloud; The wind began to rave; The ocean heaved within its shroud, For the dark had built its grave; But like ghosts brake forth, and cried aloud, The white crests of the wave.

Big rain. The wind howled out, aware Of the tread of the watery west; The windows s.h.i.+vered, back waved his hair, The fireside seemed the best; But lo! a lady sat in his chair, With the moonlight across her breast.

The moonbeam pa.s.sed. The lady sat on.

Her beauty was sad and white.

All but her hair with whiteness shone, And her hair was black as night; And her eyes, where darkness was never gone, Although they were full of light.

But her hair was wet, and wept like weeds On her pearly shoulders bare; And the clear pale drops ran down like beads, Down her arms, to her fingers fair; And her limbs s.h.i.+ne through, like thin-filmed seeds, Her dank white robe's despair.

She moved not, but looked in his wondering face, Till his blushes began to rise; But she gazed, like one on the veiling lace, To something within his eyes; A gaze that had not to do with place, But thought and spirit tries.

Then the voice came forth, all sweet and clear, Though jarred by inward pain; She spoke like one that speaks in fear Of the judgment she will gain, When the soul is full as a mountain-mere, And the speech, but a flowing vein.

"Thine eyes are like mine, and thou art bold; Nay, heap not the dying fire; It warms not me, I am too cold, Cold as the churchyard spire; If thou cover me up with fold on fold, Thou kill'st not the coldness dire."

Her voice and her beauty, like molten gold, Thrilled through him in burning rain.

He was on fire, and she was cold, Cold as the waveless main; But his heart-well filled with woe, till it rolled A torrent that calmed him again.

"Save me, Oh, save me!" she cried; and flung Her splendour before his feet;-- "I am weary of wandering storms among, And I hate the mouldy sheet; I can dare the dark, wind-vexed and wrung, Not the dark where the dead things meet.

"Ah! though a ghost, I'm a lady still--"

The youth recoiled aghast.

With a pa.s.sion of sorrow her great eyes fill; Not a word her white lips pa.s.sed.

He caught her hand; 'twas a cold to kill, But he held it warm and fast.

"What can I do to save thee, dear?"

At the word she sprang upright.

To her ice-lips she drew his burning ear, And whispered--he s.h.i.+vered--she whispered light.

She withdrew; she gazed with an asking fear; He stood with a face ghost-white.

"I wait--ah, would I might wait!" she said; "But the moon sinks in the tide; Thou seest it not; I see it fade, Like one that may not bide.

Alas! I go out in the moonless shade; Ah, kind! let me stay and hide."

He s.h.i.+vered, he shook, he felt like clay; And the fear went through his blood; His face was an awful ashy grey, And his veins were channels of mud.

The lady stood in a white dismay, Like a half-blown frozen bud.

"Ah, speak! am I so frightful then?

I live; though they call it death; I am only cold--say _dear_ again"-- But scarce could he heave a breath; The air felt dank, like a frozen fen, And he a half-conscious wraith.

"Ah, save me!" once more, with a hopeless cry, That entered his heart, and lay; But suns.h.i.+ne and warmth and rosiness vie With coldness and moonlight and grey.

He spoke not. She moved not; yet to his eye, She stood three paces away.

She spoke no more. Grief on her face Beauty had almost slain.

With a feverous vision's unseen pace She had flitted away again; And stood, with a last dumb prayer for grace, By the window that clanged with rain.

He stood; he stared. She had vanished quite.

The loud wind sank to a sigh; Grey faces without paled the face of night, As they swept the window by; And each, as it pa.s.sed, pressed a cheek of fright To the gla.s.s, with a staring eye.

And over, afar from over the deep, Came a long and cadenced wail; It rose, and it sank, and it rose on the steep Of the billows that build the gale.

It ceased; but on in his bosom creep Low echoes that tell the tale.

He opened his lattice, and saw afar, Over the western sea, Across the spears of a sparkling star, A moony vapour flee; And he thought, with a pang that he could not bar, The lady it might be.

He turned and looked into the room; And lo! it was cheerless and bare; Empty and drear as a hopeless tomb,-- And the lady was not there; Yet the fire and the lamp drove out the gloom, As he had driven the fair.

And up in the manhood of his breast, Sprang a storm of pa.s.sion and shame; It tore the pride of his fancied best In a thousand shreds of blame; It threw to the ground his ancient crest, And puffed at his ancient name.

He had turned a lady, and lightly clad, Out in the stormy cold.

Was she a ghost?--Divinely sad Are the guests of Hades old.

A wandering ghost? Oh! terror bad, That refused an earthly fold!

And sorrow for her his shame's regret Into humility wept; He knelt and he kissed the footprints wet, And the track by her thin robe swept; He sat in her chair, all ice-cold yet, And moaned until he slept.

He woke at dawn. The flaming sun Laughed at the bye-gone dark.

"I am glad," he said, "that the night is done, And the dream slain by the lark."

And the eye was all, until the gun That boomed at the sun-set--hark!

And then, with a sudden invading blast, He knew that it was no dream.

And all the night belief held fast, Till thinned by the morning beam.

Thus radiant mornings and pale nights pa.s.sed On the backward-flowing stream.

He loved a lady with heaving breath, Red lips, and a smile alway; And her sighs an odour inhabiteth, All of the rose-hued may; But the warm bright lady was false as death, And the ghost is true as day.