They pass in a half embrace

       Of linkèd bodies, and they talk

       With dark face leaning to face.

       Come then, my love, come as you will

       Along this haunted road,

       Be whom you will, my darling, I shall

       Keep with you the troth I trowed.

      Sorrow

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      Why does the thin grey strand

       Floating up from the forgotten

       Cigarette between my fingers,

       Why does it trouble me?

       Ah, you will understand;

       When I carried my mother downstairs,

       A few times only, at the beginning

       Of her soft-foot malady,

       I should find, for a reprimand

       To my gaiety, a few long grey hairs

       On the breast of my coat; and one by one

       I let them float up the dark chimney.

      Dolor of Autumn

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      The acrid scents of autumn,

       Reminiscent of slinking beasts, make me fear

       Everything, tear-trembling stars of autumn

       And the snore of the night in my ear.

       For suddenly, flush-fallen,

       All my life, in a rush

       Of shedding away, has left me

       Naked, exposed on the bush.

       I, on the bush of the globe,

       Like a newly-naked berry, shrink

       Disclosed: but I also am prowling

       As well in the scents that slink

       Abroad: I in this naked berry

       Of flesh that stands dismayed on the bush;

       And I in the stealthy, brindled odours

       Prowling about the lush

       And acrid night of autumn;

       My soul, along with the rout,

       Rank and treacherous, prowling,

       Disseminated out.

       For the night, with a great breath intaken,

       Has taken my spirit outside

       Me, till I reel with disseminated consciousness,

       Like a man who has died.

       At the same time I stand exposed

       Here on the bush of the globe,

       A newly-naked berry of flesh

       For the stars to probe.

      The Inheritance

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      Since you did depart

       Out of my reach, my darling,

       Into the hidden,

       I see each shadow start

       With recognition, and I

       Am wonder-ridden.

       I am dazed with the farewell,

       But I scarcely feel your loss.

       You left me a gift

       Of tongues, so the shadows tell

       Me things, and silences toss

       Me their drift.

       You sent me a cloven fire

       Out of death, and it burns in the draught

       Of the breathing hosts,

       Kindles the darkening pyre

       For the sorrowful, till strange brands waft

       Like candid ghosts.

       Form after form, in the streets

       Waves like a ghost along,

       Kindled to me;

       The star above the house-top greets

       Me every eve with a long

       Song fierily.

       All day long, the town

       Glimmers with subtle ghosts

       Going up and down

       In a common, prison-like dress;

       But their daunted looking flickers

       To me, and I answer, Yes!

       So I am not lonely nor sad

       Although bereaved of you,

       My little love.

       I move among a kinsfolk clad

       With words, but the dream shows through

       As they move.

      Silence

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      Since I lost you I am silence-haunted,

       Sounds wave their little wings

       A moment, then in weariness settle

       On the flood that soundless swings.

       Whether the people in the street

       Like pattering ripples go by,

       Or whether the theatre sighs and sighs

       With a loud, hoarse sigh:

       Or the wind shakes a ravel of light

       Over the dead-black river,

       Or night's last echoing

       Makes the daybreak shiver:

       I feel the silence waiting

       To take them all up again

       In its vast completeness, enfolding

       The sound of men.

      Listening

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      I listen to the stillness of you,

       My dear, among it all;

       I feel your silence touch my words as I talk,

       And take them in thrall.

       My words fly off a forge

       The length of a spark;

       I see the night-sky easily sip them

       Up in the dark.

       The lark sings loud and glad,

       Yet I am not loth

       That silence should take the song and the bird

       And lose them both.

       A train goes roaring south,