The Stars in the Pool: A Prose Poem for Lovers

by Edna Kingsley Wallace

XI.

The Shadows Grow Long

NOW when they had eaten and drunk their fill, and had had much talk withal, the shadows had grown long, and bird-song rippled the air in the wont of sundown. Wherefore King Telwyn bethought him how it would be pleasant that the four of them, the Queen, the Princess Roseheart, and her troth-plight lord, Flame, should walk in the forest for a space, ere yet they returned to the castle. Queen Ellaline SpeakethBut Queen Ellaline said to him, "Nay, my lord, shall not thou and I return to the castle alone? Well I wot these twain have much to say, each to the other. Were it not well that they should walk apart in the forest in the cool of the evening, if that be their wish?"

And King Telwyn smiled thereat, saying, "Well, well! Certain it is that I am but a stupid man, and thy woman's wit in the right of it." And therewith he bade the young pair go apart as they wished for the space of an hour or two.

But ere they went their ways, Flame raised to his lips the Flame Showeth Gratitudehand of the Queen, and kissed it, forasmuch as he was grateful to her exceedingly that she had had thought and remembrance of the need of young lovers to be alone together.

Whereafter, the King and the Queen having turned their steps to the castle, Flame and the Princess Roseheart wandered in sweet content in the path that led to the Pool, where aforetime they had found their love and their destiny.

And when they were come thither, they found there, fluttering like butterflies in a shaft of sunlight that came under the trees and among the stems Roseheart Radiantthereof, children that sported about the Pool. And these, forsaking their play, clamoured about the Princess Roseheart, in sweet rivalry of her love and her touch. And forasmuch as his beloved stood now in the shaft of sunlight, radiant, starry-eyed, with little children about her knees, Flame, the Giver of Dreams, worshiped her in his soul, and stooped him to the earth that he might seize the clay thereof, and mixing it with water from the Pool, fashion the likeness of her. But though mightily he strove, the cunning of his hands was withholden from him, and he might not.

Then the children, seeing it was The Dusk Comethlate, flitted away to their homes, and the sunlight grew faint and fainter, until the dusk was come, all suddenly. And as the twain stood a little apart, each from the other, there passed between them, as she had been a night-moth, Wur, the Old Gray Woman of Shadows, whose eyes were as misty pools at twilight, her hair like cobwebs matted, and her garments as the wings of the dusk. And momently there was upon them a chill as of the winter-death.

Then did Flame know in his heart that he must tell his white-souled love, Roseheart, of the moon-woman in the desert. And his heart shook at thought Hand in Handof her grief and trouble thereat. But being a true man, and strong for the more part, he knew that it were an ill thing to set forward the time of saying that which must be said. Therefore he took his love by the hand, and led her to a mossy bank, whereupon they sat them down, hand in hand. After a little he said: "There is a thing that I must tell thee, but because thou art a maid and innocent, I know not if thou wilt understand."