derstand,--
For oft I have watched it draw to land,
And lift from the water a ghastly hand
And a face whose eyeballs glisten.

And this is the reason why every year
To the hideous water of Ashly Mere
I come when the woodland leaves are sear,
And the autumn moon hangs hoary:
For here by the mere was wrought a wrong ...
But the old, old story is over long--
And woman is weak and man is strong ...
And the mere's and mine is the story.

BEFORE THE TOMB.

The way went under cedared gloom
To moonlight, like a cactus bloom,
Before the entrance of her tomb.

I had an hour of night and thin
Sad starlight; and I set my chin
Against the grating and looked in.

A gleam, like moonlight, through a square
Of opening--I knew not where--
Shone on her coffin resting there.

And on its oval silver-plate
I read her name and age and date,
And smiled, soft-thinking on my hate.

There was no insect sound to chirr;
No wind to make a little stir.
I stood and looked and thought on her.

The gleam stole downward from her head,
Till at her feet it rested red
On Gothic gold, that sadly said:--

"God to her love lent a weak reed
Of strength: and gave no light to lead:
Pray for her soul; for it hath need."

There was no night-bird's twitter near,
No low vague water I might hear
To make a small sound in the ear.

The gleam, that made a burning mark
Of each dim word, died to a spark;
Then left the tomb and coffin dark.

I had a little while to wait;
And prayed with hands against the grate,
And heart that yearned and knew too late.

There was no light below, above,
To point my soul the way thereof,--
The way of hate that led to love.

REVISITED.

It was beneath a waning moon when all the woods were sear,
And winds made eddies of the leaves that whispered far and near,
I met her on the old mill-bridge we parted at last year.

At first I deemed it but a mist that faltered in that place,
An autumn mist beneath the trees that sentineled the race;
Until I neared and in the moon beheld her face to face.

The waver of the summer-heat upon the drouth-dry leas;
The shimmer of the thistle-drift a down the silences;
The gliding of the fairy-fire between the swamp and trees;

They qualified her presence as a sorrow may a dream--
The vague suggestion of a self; the glimmer of a gleam;
The actual unreal