The sparks of the star in her pupils gleamed,
She was vague as a vapour now,
And ere of its meaning I had dreamed
She’d vanished—I knew not how.
I stood on, long; each cliff-top bough,
Like a cynic nodding there,
Moved up and down, though no man’s brow
But mine met the wayward air.
Still stood I, wholly unaware
Of what had come to pass,
Or had brought the secret of my new Fair
To my old Love, alas!
I went down then by crag and grass
To the boat wherein I had come.
Said the man with the oars: “This news of the lass
Of Edgcumbe, is sharp for some!
“Yes: found this daybreak, stiff and numb
On the shore here, whither she’d sped
To meet her lover last night in the glum,
And he came not, ’tis said.
“And she leapt down, heart-hit. Pity she’s dead:
So much for the faithful-bent!” . . .
I looked, and again a star overhead
Shot through the firmament.
SHE WHO SAW NOT
“Did you see something within the house
That made me call you before the red sunsetting?
Something that all this common scene endows
With a richened impress there can be no forgetting?”
“—I have found nothing to see therein,
O Sage, that should have made you urge me to enter,
Nothing to fire the soul, or the sense to win:
I rate you as a rare misrepresenter!”
“—Go anew, Lady,—in by the right . . .
Well: why does your face not shine like the face of Moses?”
“—I found no moving thing there save the light
And shadow flung on the wall by the outside roses.”