There's laughter in the wings;
'Tis sawdust that they bleed,
But a box Death brings.

How rare a skill is theirs
These extreme pangs to show,
How real a frenzy wears
Each feigner of woe!

Gigantic dins uprise!
Even the gods must feel
A smarting of the eyes
As these fumes upsweal.

Strange, such a Piece is free,
While we Spectators sit,
Aghast at its agony,
Yet absorbed in it!

Dark is the outer air,
Cold the night draughts blow
Mutely we stare, and stare
At the frenzied Show.

Yet heaven hath its quiet shroud
Of deep, immutable blue--
We cry "An end!" We are bowed
By the dread, "'Tis true!"

While the Shape who hoofs applause
Behind our deafened ear,
Hoots--angel-wise--"the Cause!"
And affright even fear.

TO E.T.: 1917

You sleep too well--too far away,
For sorrowing word to soothe or wound;
Your very quiet seems to say
How longed-for a peace you have found.

Else, had not death so lured you on,
You would have grieved--'twixt joy and fear--
To know how my small loving son
Had wept for you, my dear.

APRIL MOON

Roses are sweet to smell and see,
And lilies on the stem;
But rarer, stranger buds there be,
And she was like to them.

The little moon that April brings,
More lovely shade than light,
That, setting, silvers lonely hills
Upon the verge of night--

Close to the world of my poor heart
So stole she, still and clear;
Now that she's gone, O dark, and dark,
The solitude, the fear.

THE FOOL'S SONG

Never, no never, listen too long,
To the chattering wind in the willow, the night bird's song.

'Tis sad in sooth to lie under the grass,
But none too gladsome to wake and grow cold where life's shadows pass.

Dumb the old Toll-Woman squats,
And, for every green copper battered and worn, doles out Nevers and Nots.

I know a Blind Man, too,
Who with a sharp ear listens and listens the whole world through.

Oh, sit we snug to our feast,
With platter and finger and spoon--and good victuals at least.

CLEAR EYES

Clear eyes do dim at last,
And cheeks outlive their rose.
Time, heedless of the past,
No loving-kindness knows;
Chill unto mortal lip
Still Lethe flows.

Griefs, too, but brief while stay,
And sorrow, being o'er,
Its salt tears shed away,
Woundeth the heart no more.
Stealthily lave those waters
That solemn shore.

Ah, then, sweet face burn on,