I have no words to tell what way we walked. What unforgotten path now closed and sealed; I have no words to tell all things we talked, All things that he revealed: 60 This only can I tell: that hour by hour I waxed more feastful, lifted up and glad; I felt no thorn-prick when I plucked a flower, Felt not my friend was sad. 'To-morrow,' once I said to him with smiles: 'To-night,' he answered gravely and was dumb, But pointed out the stones that numbered miles And miles to come. 'Not so,' I said: 'to-morrow shall be sweet; To-night is not so sweet as coming days.' 70 Then first I saw that he had turned his feet, Had turned from me his face: Running and flying miles and miles he went, But once looked back to beckon with his hand And cry: 'Come home, O love, from banishment: Come to the distant land.' That night destroyed me like an avalanche; One night turned all my summer back to snow: Next morning not a bird upon my branch, Not a lamb woke below,-- 80 No bird, no lamb, no living breathing thing; No squirrel scampered on my breezy lawn, No mouse lodged by his hoard: all joys took wing And fled before that dawn. Azure and sun were starved from heaven above, No dew had fallen, but biting frost lay hoar: O love, I knew that I should meet my love, Should find my love no more. 'My love no more,' I muttered stunned with pain: I shed no tear, I wrung no passionate hand, 90 Till something whispered: 'You shall meet again, Meet in a distant land.' Then with a cry like famine I arose, I lit my candle, searched from room to room, Searched up and down; a war of winds that froze Swept through the blank of gloom. I searched day after day, night after night; Scant change there came to me of night or day: 'No more,' I wailed, 'no more:' and trimmed my light, And gnashed but did not pray, 100 Until my heart broke and my spirit broke: Upon the frost-bound floor I stumbled, fell, And moaned: 'It is enough: withhold the stroke. Farewell, O love, farewell.' Then life swooned from me. And I heard the song Of spheres and spirits rejoicing over me: One cried: 'Our sister, she hath suffered long.'-- One answered: 'Make her see.'-- One cried: 'Oh blessed she who no more pain, Who no more disappointment shall receive.'-- 110 One answered: 'Not so: she must live again; Strengthen thou her to live.' So while I lay entranced a curtain seemed To shrivel with crackling from before my face; Across mine eyes a waxing radiance beamed And showed a certain place. I saw a vision of a woman, where Night and new morning strive for domination; Incomparably pale, and almost fair, And sad beyond expression. 120