My stitches, like the even tide of feet
Beating against the pavement of the street
Below my window-sill, forever run
Before the footsteps of the sun.
Down streets of seams, and formal avenues
Of basted hems, each crowding stitch pursues.
Seeking no destination on the way —
Only the end of day.
Creatures of gauze and velvet wings,
With life for one brief day,
Dancing and flitting where the breezes fling
The sweets of blooming May;
Skimming the stream where the wild thyme grows,
You dart with keen delight.
Only to die when the sweet wild rose
Gives perfume to the night.
Weary at last, when the day is done,
Of the breeze and clover's breath.
Folding your delicate wings with the sun,
You gently drop to death;
Glimmering wings and a few short hours
Were yours in sweet delight.
Living for a day in the world of flowers.
And then — everlasting night.
I spoiled the day;
Hotly, in haste,
All the calm hours
I gashed and defaced.
Let me forget,
Let me embark
--Sleep for my boat--
And sail through the dark.
Till a new day
Heaven shall send,
Whole as an apple,
Kind as a friend.
There is a question that I ask,
And ask again:
What hunger was half-hidden by the mask
That he wore then?
There was a word for me to say
That I said not;
And in the past there was another day
That I forgot:
A dreary, cold, unwholesome day,
Racked overhead,--
As if the world were turning the wrong way,
And the sun dead:
A day that comes back well enough
Now he is gone.
What then? Has memory no other stuff
To seize upon?
It is but coming and going;
Laughing or weeping;
In dark or day!
Life is but a lay:
Rings sad or gay.
Depending on our singing.
Well and
If day on day
Follows, and weary year
On year . . . and ever days and years . . .
Well?