well.

And as I stooped again to look,
I heard the dark hills sigh and laugh,
And in the pool the water shook
As if one stirred it with a staff.

And all was still again and clear:
The pool lay crystal as before,
Temple and priest were gone; the mere
Had closed again its magic door.

A face was there; it seemed to shine
As round it died the sunset's flame--
The victim's face?--or was it mine?--
They were to me the very same.

And yet, and yet--could this thing be?--
And in my soul I seemed to know,
At once, this was a memory
Of some past life, lived long ago.

Recorded by some secret sense,
In forms that we as dreams retain;
Some moment, as experience,
Projects in pictures on the brain.

_THE CREAKING DOOR_

Come in, old Ghost of all that used to be!--
You find me old,
And love grown cold,
And fortune fled to younger company:
Departed, as the glory of the day,
With friends!--And you, it seems, have come to stay.--
'T is time to pray.

Come; sit with me, here at Life's creaking door,
All comfortless.--
Think, nay! then, guess,
What was the one thing, eh? that made me poor?--
The love of beauty, that I could not bind?
My dream of truth? or faith in humankind?--
But, never mind!

All are departed now, with love and youth,
Whose stay was brief;
And left but grief
And gray regret--two jades, who tell the truth;--
Whose children--memories of things to be,
And things that failed,--within my heart, ah me!
Cry constantly.

None can turn time back, and no man delay
Death when he knocks,--
What good are clocks,
Or human hearts, to stay for us that day
When at Life's creaking door we see his smile,--
Death's! at the door of this old House of Trial?--
Old Ghost, let's wait awhile.

_AT THE END OF THE ROAD_

This is the truth as I see it, my dear,
Out in the wind and the rain:
They who have nothing have little to fear,--
Nothing to lose or to gain.
Here by the road at the end o' the year,
Let us sit down and drink o' our beer,
Happy-Go-Lucky and her cavalier,
Out in the wind and the rain.

Now we are old, oh isn't it fine
Out in the wind and the rain?
Now we have nothing why snivel and whine?--
What would it br