Ask not the pallid stranger's woe,
With beating heart and throbbing breast,
Whose step is faltering, weak, and slow,
...
Her voice did quiver as we parted,
Yet knew I not that heart was broken
From which it came, and I departed
Heeding not the words then spoken.
...
'Here lieth One whose name was writ on water.
But, ere the breath that could erase it blew,
Death, in remorse for that fell slaughter,
...
A shovel of his ashes took
From the hearth's obscurest nook,
Muttering mysteries as she went.
...
He wanders, like a day-appearing dream,
Through the dim wildernesses of the mind;
Through desert woods and tracts, which seem
...
Wake the serpent not—lest he
Should not know the way to go,--
Let him crawl which yet lies sleeping
Through the deep grass of the meadow!
...
I.
Come, be happy!—sit near me,
Shadow-vested Misery:
Coy, unwilling, silent bride,
...
My thoughts arise and fade in solitude,
The verse that would invest them melts away
Like moonlight in the heaven of spreading day:
...
If solitude hath ever led thy steps
To the wild ocean's echoing shore,
And thou hast lingered there,
...
I.
The sleepless Hours who watch me as I lie,
Curtained with star-inwoven tapestries,
From the broad moonlight of the sky,
...