A WOMAN'S LAST WORD. 59 A WOMAN'S LAST WORD. ET 'S contend no more, Love, L Strive nor weep, All be as before, Love, - Only sleep! Meet, if thou require it, That shall be to-morrow Not to-night: I must bury sorrow -Must a little weep, Love, -Foolish me! And so fall asleep, Love, A SERENADE AT THE VILLA. THAT HAT was I, you heard last night Not a twinkle from the fly, Not a glimmer from the worm. When the crickets stopped their cry, When the owls forbore a term, You heard music; that was I. Earth turned in her sleep with pain, Lightning! - where it broke the roof, Bloodlike, some few drops of rain. A SERENADE AT THE VILLA. What they could my words expressed, And when singing's best was done, So wore night; the east was gray, White the broad-faced hemlock flowers; Soon would come another day; Ere its first of heavy hours Found me, I had past away. What became of all the hopes, Words and song and lute as well? Say, this struck you, When life gropes Feebly for the path where fell Light last on the evening slopes, "One friend in that path shall be To secure my steps from wrong; One to count night day for me, Patient through the watches long, Serving most with none to see." "When no moon succeeds the sun, Nor can pierce the midnight's tent Any star, the smallest one, While some drops, where lightning went, Show the final storm begun, "When the fire-fly hides its spot, 61 Shall another voice avail, That shape be where those are not? "Has some plague a longer lease As one shuts one's eyes on youth, BE EVELYN HOPE. EAUTIFUL Evelyn Hope is dead! Sit and watch by her side an hour. That is her book-shelf, this her bed; She plucked that piece of geranium-flower, Beginning to die too, in the glass. Little has yet been changed, I think, The shutters are shut, no light may pass Save two long rays through the hinge's chink. Sixteen years old when she died! Perhaps she had scarcely heard my name, It was not her time to love: beside, Her life had many a hope and aim, Duties enough and little cares, And now was quiet, now astir, Till God's hand beckoned unawares, And the sweet white brow is all of her. Is it too late then, Evelyn Hope? And our paths in the world diverged so wide, No, indeed! for God above Is great to grant, as mighty to make, And creates the love to reward the love, I claim you still, for my own love's sake! Delayed it may be for more lives yet, Through worlds I shall traverse, not a few, Much is to learn and much to forget Ere the time be come for taking you. But the time will come, When, Evelyn Hope, what meant, I shall say, And your mouth of your own geranium's red, And what you would do with me, in fine, In the new life come in the old one's stead. I have lived, I shall say, so much since then, Gained me the gains of various men, Ransacked the ages, spoiled the climes; |