I WAS the midmost of my world When first I frisked me free, For though within its circuit gleamed But a small company, And I was immature, they seemed To bend their looks on me. She was the midmost of my world When I went further forth, And hence it was that, whether I turned To south, east, west, or north, Beams of an all-day Polestar burned From that new axe of earth. Where now is midmost in my world? I trace it not at all: No midmost shows it here, or there, When wistful voices call “We are fain! We are fain!” from everywhere On Earth’s bewildering ball! A SOUND IN THE NIGHT (WOODSFORD CASTLE: 17–) “WHAT do I catch upon the night-wind, husband?— What is it sounds in this house so eerily? It seems to be a woman’s voice: each little while I hear it, And it much troubles me!” “’Tis but the eaves dripping down upon the plinth-slopes: Letting fancies worry thee!—sure ’tis a foolish thing, When we were on’y coupled half-an-hour before the noontide, And now it’s but evening.” “Yet seems it still a woman’s voice outside the castle, husband, And ’tis cold to-night, and rain beats, and this is a lonely place. Didst thou fathom much of womankind in travel or adventure Ere ever thou sawest my face?” “It may be a tree, bride, that rubs his arms acrosswise, If it is not the eaves-drip upon the lower slopes, Or the river at the bend, where it whirls about the hatches Like a creature that sighs and mopes.” “Yet it still seems to me like the crying of a woman, And it saddens me much that so piteous a sound On this my bridal night when I would get agone from sorrow Should so ghost-like wander round!” “To satisfy thee, Love, I will strike the flint-and-steel, then, And set the rush-candle up, and undo the door, And take the new horn-lantern that we bought upon our journey, And throw the light over the moor.” He struck a light, and breeched and booted in the further chamber, And lit the new horn-lantern and went from her sight, And vanished down the turret; and she heard him pass the postern, And go out into the night. She listened as she lay, till she heard his step returning, And his voice as he unclothed him: “’Twas nothing, as I said, But the nor’-west wind a-blowing from the moor ath’art the river, And the tree that taps the gurgoyle-head.” “Nay, husband, you perplex me; for if the noise I heard here, Awaking me from sleep so, were but as you avow, The rain-fall, and the wind, and the tree-bough, and the river, Why is it silent now? “And why is thy hand and thy clasping arm so shaking, And thy sleeve and tags of hair so muddy and so wet, And why feel I thy heart a-thumping every time thou kissest me, And thy breath as if hard to get?”