Ah!...
yet dawns a dreary morrow:
'Spend at ease, and owe in sorrow,'
With light purse to her begone,
If but as a hanger-on!
(Dread and moonlight in my head.)
Home then: catch upon the way—
'Harlequin fled yesterday.
Bankruptcy of his employ.'
Surging of relief and joy:
Welcome then? past words unsaid?
Surge of moonlight through my head.
So on, beating, to her street:
What sight Pierrot's eyes doth greet?
One coach at her door arrives,
From the back another drives....
Strange! (mere moonlight in the head).
Pull the bell: is she within?
'I must see Miss Columbine.'
Maid with finger laid by nose,
Better not inquire too close—
Such puts bullets through the head!
Now I wander back and forth;
Pierrot goes east, south, west, north;
Shakes his head and shrugs his shoulders,
Till the more acute beholders,
Watching him, have hazarded,—
'Touch of something in the head?'
I am Pierrot, and was born
On some far forgotten morn
When the cold moon on the pane
Struck and, signless, 'gan to wane,
When the tides their flow reversed;
And I bear, uncured, accursed,
Aching until I am dead,
Moonlight, moonlight in my head!
Devonshire,
November, 1916.