Then, I sally forth, half sad, half proud,
And I come to the velvet, imperial crowd,
The wine-red, the gold, the crimson, the pied,—
The dahlias that reign by the garden-side.
The dahlias I might not touch till to-night!
A gleam of the shears in the fading light,
And I gathered them all,—the splendid throng,
And in one great sheaf I bore them along.
In my garden of Life with its all-late flowers
I heed a Voice in the shrinking hours:
"Frost to-night—so clear and dead-still ..."
Half sad, half proud, my arms I fill.
Edith M. Thomas
NOVEMBER NIGHT
Listen ...
With faint dry sound,
Like steps of passing ghosts,
The leaves, frost-crisp'd, break from the trees
And fall.
Adelaide Crapsey
THE SNOW-GARDENS
Like an empty stage
The gardens are empty and cold;
The marble terraces rise
Like vases that hold no flowers;
The lake is frozen, the fountain still;
The marble walls and the seats
Are useless and beautiful.
Ah, here
Where the wind and the dusk and the snow are
All is silent and white and sad!
Why do I think of you?
Why does your name remorselessly
Strike through my heart?
Why does my soul awaken and shudder?
Why do I seem to hear
Cries as lovely as music?
Surely you never came
Into these pale snow-gardens;
Surely you never stood
Here in the twilight with me;
Yet here I have lingered and dreamed
Of a face as subtle as music,
Of golden hair, and of eyes
Like a child's ...
I have felt on my brow
Your finger-tips, plaintive as music ...
O Wonder of all wonders, O Love—
Wrought of sweet sounds and of dreaming!—
Why do you not emerge
From the lilac pale petals of dusk,
And come to me here in the gardens
Where the wind and the snow are?