I have grown pale and paler
Since one went away,
Who passed from me as softly
As daylight leaves the day.
My hair has lost its gleaming,
The light has left my face,
I am a grey-eyed wanderer
In any lonely place.
And on my heart is moonlight
Like white rain on the sea.
And I am of the evening
As the evening is of me.
A gentle moan, remembrance,
A folded wing is love,
Since my dream stepped into shadow
On the soft feet of a dove.
It was the lovely moon--she lifted
Slowly her white brow among
Bronze cloud-waves that ebbed and drifted
Faintly, faintlier afar.
Calm she looked, yet pale with wonder,
Sweet in unwonted thoughtfulness,
Watching the earth that dwindled under
Faintly, faintlier afar.
It was the lovely moon that lovelike
Hovered over the wandering, tired
Earth, her bosom gray and dovelike,
Hovering beautiful as a dove....
The lovely moon:--her soft light falling
Lightly on roof and poplar and pine--
Tree to tree whispering and calling,
Wonderful in the silvery shine
The glory of the day was in her face,
The beauty of the night was in her eyes.
And over all her loveliness, the grace
Of Morning blushing in the early skies.
And in her voice, the calling of the dove;
Like music of a sweet, melodious part.
And in her smile, the breaking light of love;
And all the gentle virtues in her heart.
And now the glorious day, the beauteous night,
The birds that signal to their mates at dawn,
To my dull ears, to my tear-blinded sight
Are one with all the dead, since she is gone.
There are yellow birds within the cage;
Beside its gilded bars there stand the women
Whom the Great Prince loves to honour.
They wear silken robes and jewels in their hair,
And live in a pretty pink and yellow house.
But the women look not at the captive singing-birds,
Nor listen to their song,
Their eyes follow the flight of two white-breasted doves,
Winging their way towards the wind-torn clouds.
Say not of Beauty she is good,
Or aught but beautiful,
Or sleek to doves' wings of the wood
Her wild wings of a gull.
Call her not wicked; that word's touch
Consumes her like a curse;
But love her not too much, too much,
For that is even worse.
O, she is neither good nor bad,
But innocent and wild!
Enshrine her and she dies, who had
The hard heart of a child.
The cuckoo and the coo-dove's ceaseless calling,
Calling,
Of a meaningless monotony is palling
All my morning's pleasure in the sun-fleck-scattered
wood.
May-blossom and blue bird's-eye flowers falling,
Falling
In a litter through the elm-tree shade are scrawling
Messages of true-love down the dust of the highroad.
I do not like to hear the gentle grieving,
Grieving
Of the she-dove in the blossom, still believing
Love will yet again return to her and make all good.
When I know that there must ever be deceiving,
Deceiving
Of the mournful constant heart, that while she's