Let so much be said of the date-day’s sameness; But the tree that neighbours the track, And stoops like a pedlar afflicted with lameness, Knew of no sogged wound or windcrack. And the joints of that wall were not enshrouded With mosses of many tones, And the garth up afar was not overcrowded With a multitude of white stones, And the man’s eyes then were not so sunk that you saw the socket-bones. KINGSTON-MAURWARD EWELEASE. “BY THE RUNIC STONE” (_Two who became a story_) BY the Runic Stone They sat, where the grass sloped down, And chattered, he white-hatted, she in brown, Pink-faced, breeze-blown. Rapt there alone In the transport of talking so In such a place, there was nothing to let them know What hours had flown. And the die thrown By them heedlessly there, the dent It was to cut in their encompassment, Were, too, unknown. It might have strown Their zest with qualms to see, As in a glass, Time toss their history From zone to zone! THE PINK FROCK “O MY pretty pink frock, I sha’n’t be able to wear it! Why is he dying just now? I hardly can bear it! “He might have contrived to live on; But they say there’s no hope whatever: And must I shut myself up, And go out never? “O my pretty pink frock, Puff-sleeved and accordion-pleated! He might have passed in July, And not so cheated!” TRANSFORMATIONS PORTION of this yew Is a man my grandsire knew, Bosomed here at its foot: This branch may be his wife, A ruddy human life Now turned to a green shoot. These grasses must be made Of her who often prayed, Last century, for repose; And the fair girl long ago Whom I often tried to know May be entering this rose. So, they are not underground, But as nerves and veins abound In the growths of upper air, And they feel the sun and rain, And the energy again That made them what they were! IN HER PRECINCTS HER house looked cold from the foggy lea, And the square of each window a dull black blur Where showed no stir: Yes, her gloom within at the lack of me Seemed matching mine at the lack of her. The black squares grew to be squares of light As the eyeshade swathed the house and lawn, And viols gave tone; There was glee within. And I found that night The gloom of severance mine alone. KINGSTON-MAURWARD PARK. THE LAST SIGNAL (_Oct._ 11, 1886) A MEMORY OF WILLIAM BARNES SILENTLY I footed by an uphill road That led from my abode to a spot yew-boughed; Yellowly the sun sloped low down to westward, And dark was the east with cloud.