If a ghost could patch its tomb With a trowel from time to time, If it had a little lime, So as to stop the cracks and growing rifts, That would be like this man who hated gifts Because he scarce could give them, and had patched With hardness where his heart had broken In years gone for the holidays when she Cried in such ignorance of his poverty. Now with walled feelings he could sit unspoken Of what he felt, regretted, or had lost-- He was that kind of ghost. So when the daughter came he only had Her mother and the dinner, greetings glad, And certain pride because her life had matched With childhood’s hopes--but still he had no gifts For Christmas or for New Year’s, and the daughter Wept when she found it so,--’twas always so,-- It made her youthful bitterness alive. And so she spilled her water Out of a trembling hand at dinner and arose And left the table. But with specs on nose Self-mastered, not revealing What was his feeling, The father ate the dinner alone, while mother Was comforting the daughter. “He might have given me a dollar, a little book, A handkerchief, or any other Little thing, he always acted so.” The mother tried to soothe her daughter’s woe. But while they were together, the father took His steps up town and when the two came back They found him gone and the room growing black From falling night.... But later he came in And sat by the fire all silent. This had been His New Year’s day! And later his wife came And sat across him silent in her blame Of him and of his life. She said at last: “Blanche is heart sick.” “Well, I am sixty-five,” He answered her, “and never while I’m alive Will I remember Christmas or a New Year’s day. I’m glad so many of such days are past, They have been always this way. We had dinner And ourselves for her and she brought herself And nothing else. This is the way to win her Admiration, yet this thing of giving Dollars or books, wins only a little thrill Of tickled pride or egotism, still I might have done it, just to have the peace Of her self-satisfaction.” Said the wife: “You might find happiness in her happiness. The only thing you understand in living Is how to stand your misery, one can guess The working of your thought.” Ere she could cease The daughter entered like the devil’s elf, And saw her father bent before the fire, And saw the back of his head which spoke to her Of hardness, or of something that she hated Which moved her pity and her hate at once.