So now shall I send her north to wed,
Who here may know
Only the little house of the dead
To ease her woe?
Or keep her for fear of that old woman,
As a bird quick-eyed,
And her tall son who is hardly human,
At the woodside?
She is my babe and my daughter dear,
How well, how well.
Her grief to me is a fourfold fear,
Tongue cannot tell.
And yet I know that far in that wood
Are crumbling bones,
And a mumble mumble of nothing that’s good,
In heathen tones.
And I know that frail ghosts flutter and sigh
In brambles there,
And never a bird or beast to cry—
Beware, beware,—
While threading the silent thickets go
Mother and son,
Where scrupulous berries never grow,
And airs are none.
And her deep eyes peer at eventide
Out of the wood,
And her tall son waits by the dark woodside
For maidenhood.
And the little eyes peer, and peer, and peer;
And a word is said.
And some house knows, for many a year,
But years of dread.