WHICH?
The wind was on the forest,
And silence on the wold;
And darkness on the waters,
And heaven was starry cold;
When Sleep, with all her magic,
Made me this thing behold:
This side, an iron woodland;
That side, an iron waste;
Between which rose a tower,
Wherein a wan light paced,
A light, or phantom woman
Ice-eyed and icy-faced.
And through the iron tower
Of silence and of night,
My Soul and I went only,
My Soul, whose face was white,
Whose one hand signed me listen,
One bore a taper-light.
For, lo! a voice behind me
Kept sighing in my ear
The dreams my mind accepted,
My heart refused to hear—
Of one I loved and loved not,
Whose spirit now was near,
And, lo! a voice before me
Kept calling constantly
The hopes my heart accepted,
My mind refused to see—
Of one I loved and loved not,
Whose spirit spake to me.
This way the one would bid me;
This way the other saith:—
Sweet is the voice behind me
Of Life that followeth;
And sweet the voice before me
Of Life whose name is Death.
STORM
I looked into the night and saw
God writing with tumultuous flame
Upon the thunder’s front of awe,—
As on sonorous brass,—the Law,
Terrific, of His judgment name.
Weary of all life’s best and worst,
With hands of hate, I—who had pled,
I, who had prayed for death at first
And had not died—now stood and cursed
God, yet He would not strike me dead.