And he sees it stop, and hover
Round a bed, with wavering will,
Like a bat which, ere it settles,
Flits in circles ever smaller,
Nearer, nearer, nearer still.
Then it bends across the sleeper
Restless in the sultry night,
And begins to fan him gently
With its garment, till his slumber
Groweth deep, and dreamless quite;
And its corpse-like face unstiffens
And its dead eyes seem to gloat
As, approaching and approaching,
It applies its mouth of horror
Slowly, firmly, to his throat.
Sister Mary, Sister Mary,
Has no rumour told thee this?
What if he whose life thou lovest
Like thine own, and more, were dying
Of that long terrific kiss?
III.
From the Hospital’s arched window,
Open to the summer air,
You can see the monks in couples
All returning home at sunset
Through the old cathedral square.
On the steps of the cathedral,
In the weak declining sun
Sit the beggars and the cripples;
While faint gusts of organ-rolling
Tell that vespers have begun.
Slowly creeps the tide of shadow
Up the steps of sculptured front,
Driving back the yellow sunshine
On each pinnacle and buttress
Which the twilight soon makes blunt.
Slowly evening grasps the city,
And the square grows still and lone;
No one passes save, it may be,
Up the steps and through the portal,
Some stray monk or tottering crone.
In this room, which seems the study
Of the Hospital’s chief leech,
There is no one; but the twilight
Makes all objects seem mysterious,
Like a conscious watcher each.