The Old Nail-Shop
I dreamt of wings, — and waked to hear
Through the low-sloping ceiling clear
The nesting starlings flutter and scratch
Among the rafters of the thatch,
Not twenty inches from my head;
And lay, half-dreaming in my bed,
Watching the far elms — bolt-upright
Black towers of silence in a night
Of stars, between the window-sill
And the low-hung eaves, square-framed, until
I drowsed, and must have slept a wink . . .
And wakened to a ceaseless clink
Of hammers ringing on the air ...
And, somehow, only half-aware,
I'd risen and crept down the stair,
Bewildered by strange smoky gloom,