LITMIR.BIZ

      I woke, with calmness cleansed and sanctified—

        The peace that filled my heart of old, when I

        Woke in my mother's lap; for since I died

      The past lay bare, even to the dreaming shy

        That shadowed my yet gathering unborn brain.

        And, marvelling, on the floor I saw, close by

      My elbow-pillowed head, as if it had lain

        Beside me all the time I dreamless lay,

        A little pool of sunlight, which did stain

      The earthen brown with gold; marvelling, I say,

        Because, across the sea and through the wood,

        No sun had shone upon me all the way.

      I rose, and through a chink the glade I viewed,

        But all was dull as it had always been,

        And sunless every tree-top round it stood,

      With hardly light enough to show it green;

        Yet through the broken roof, serenely glad,

        By a rough hole entered that heavenly sheen.

      Then I remembered in old years I had

        Seen such a light—where, with dropt eyelids gloomed,

        Sitting on such a floor, dark women sad

      In a low barn-like house where lay entombed

        Their sires and children; only there the door

        Was open to the sun, which entering plumed

      With shadowy palms the stones that on the floor

        Stood up like lidless chests—again to find

        That the soul needs no brain, but keeps her store

      In hidden chambers of the eternal mind.

        Thence backward ran my roused Memory

        Down the ever-opening vista—back to blind

      Anticipations while my soul did lie

        Closed in my mother's; forward thence through bright

        Spring morns of childhood, gay with hopes that fly

      Bird-like across their doming blue and white,

       To passionate summer noons, to saddened eves

        Of autumn rain, so on to wintred night;

      Thence up once more to the dewy dawn that weaves

        Saffron and gold—weaves hope with still content,

        And wakes the worship that even wrong bereaves

      Of half its pain. And round her as she went

        Hovered a sense as of an odour dear

        Whose flower was far—as of a letter sent

      Not yet arrived—a footstep coming near,

        But, oh, how long delayed the lifting latch!—

        As of a waiting sun, ready to peer

      Yet peering not—as of a breathless watch

        Over a sleeping beauty—babbling rime

        About her lips, but no winged word to catch!

      And here I lay, the child of changeful Time

        Shut in the weary, changeless Evermore,

        A dull, eternal, fadeless, fruitless clime!

      Was this the dungeon of my sinning sore—

        A gentle hell of loneliness, foredoomed

        For such as I, whose love was yet the core

      Of all my being? The brown shadow gloomed

        Persistent, faded, warm. No ripple ran

        Across the air, no roaming insect boomed.

      "Alas," I cried, "I am no living man!

        Better were darkness and the leave to grope

        Than light that builds its own drear prison! Can

      This be the folding of the wings of Hope?"

      That instant—through the branches overhead

        No sound of going went—a shadow fell

        Isled in the unrippled pool of sunlight fed

      From some far fountain hid in heavenly dell.

        I looked, and in the low roofs broken place

        A single snowdrop stood—a radiant bell

      Of silvery shine, softly subdued by grace

        Of delicate green that made the white appear

        Yet whiter. Blind it bowed its head a space,

      Half-timid—then, as in despite of fear,

        Unfolded its three rays. If it had swung

        Its pendent bell, and music golden clear—

      Division just entrancing sounds among—

        Had flickered down as tender as flakes of snow,

        It had not shed more influence as it rung

      Than from its look alone did rain and flow.

        I knew the flower; perceived its human ways;

        Dim saw the secret that had made it grow:

      My heart supplied the music's golden phrase.

        Light from the dark and snowdrops from the earth,

        Life's resurrection out of gross decays,

      The endless round of beauty's yearly birth,

        And nations' rise and fall—were in the flower,

        And read themselves in silence. Heavenly mirth

      Awoke in my sad heart. For one whole hour

        I praised the God of snowdrops. But at height

        The bliss gave way. Next, faith began to cower;

      And then the snowdrop vanished from my sight.

      Last, I began in unbelief to say:

        "No

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