From her terrace she shall see
Lines of birds like dusky motes
Falling in the heated glare;
How an eagle floats
In the wan unconscious air.
From her turret she shall see
Vision of a cloudy place,
Like a group of opal flowers
On the verge of space,
Or a town, or crown of towers.
From her garden she shall hear
Fall the cones between the pines;
She shall seem to hear the sea,
Or behind the vines
Some small noise, a voice may be.
But no thing shall habit there,
There no human foot shall fall,
No sweet word the silence stir,
Naught her name shall call,
Nothing come to comfort her.
But about the middle night,
When the dusk is loathéd most,
Ancient thoughts and words long said,
Like an alien host,
There shall come unsummonéd.
With her forehead on her wrist
She shall lean against the wall
And see all the dream go by;
In the interval
Time shall turn Eternity.
But the agony shall pass—
Fainting with unuttered prayer,
She shall see the world’s outlines
And the weary glare
And the bare unvaried pines.