DIM twilight here; and in her singing mind
Dim twilight too. Shut in this darkened room,
Over whose broad-beamed walls the shadows bloom,
All day she lies;
Yet will her sweet thoughts find
Nothing but praise to tell until she dies.
No footstep passes but she knows the tread,
And each some pastoral-memory awakes
Within her dreamy head.
Or when the barley-wains
Go rumbling past, darkly her old brain tells
Of other wagons jolting up the lanes
In days long since; then breaks
A tear from shrunken lids the while she dwells
On far-off romping harvests that she knew
Where Ned and she to their shy loving drew.
Sometimes, for hours, no company she knows
But chattering birds
That rustle in her eaves, when the wind blows
Sparrows and starlings, jostling, helter-skelter,
To the thatch for shelter;
Yet are their pipings plain to her as words.
Or she will turn to the window’s leaded panes —
On loved scenes lingering long;
And whether sun makes bright the land, or rains
Close it in tremulous veils, one song
Is ever at her lips — though mutely thrown
To the still air — of love and love alone.
And when the twilight fades and wagons come
Wheeling their yellow lights about her room,
As to the farm they pass along,
Their very creaking is an evensong.
So, with their little circumstance, the days
Draw to a close; this nights dark vigil keep
Unblessed of sleep;
Yet is her every word a meed of praise.
Such peace is hers, no knowledge gives,
Who, to no other end than loving, lives:
Such faith, no knowledge now can try,
With urgent Wherefor, Why,
To dim the brightness of her old belief.
Out of her very grief
Has grown this rich content,
Easing her soul in its lone banishment.
And often, in her dreams, the skies are riven
With a great light, till her accustomed eyes
Behold the blaze of heaven.
Upon her ears a singing breaks; the skies
Fold back and ever back; and flaxen-fair
The angels are, moving in beauty there.
The memory is so bright for her
That, waking, still she fears to stir
Lest this her room and these her hands should be
A borrowed dream out of Eternity.
(C Henry Warren)
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Based on Topics: Love Poems, Light Poems, War & Peace Poems, Heaven Poems, Dreams Poems, Beauty Poems, Sleep Poems, Belief & Faith Poems, Past Poems, Praise Poems, Lies & Deceit PoemsBased on Keywords: evensong, jolting, unblessed, helter-skelter, pipings, wherefor, leaded, broad-beamed