University of Virginia Library

The last words in the rafters rang,
The bright haze sounded on;
Walls, air and shadows vibrant still,
The God himself was gone.
Was the thing dreamed? The Tavern wall
Solid? Still it rang.
Feverish he threw the lattice back;
Outside fluttered and sang
Trees of a tract of narrow yards
Behind dark tenements,
The nearest garden vacant—rope
Eked out its broken fence.
Naked it lay—brown mould bestrewn
With refuse crockery—yet
A pear-tree in its darkest nook
Bowered it in delicate
Whiteness. Beyond its further pale
Above a wall-flower bed
Women were hanging linen out—
One stoop'd a kerchief'd head.
In lime-trees idle rooks were cawing;
Even to his upper room
Came wafted from some distant plot
Fragrance like thyme's perfume;
Adrift from zigzag chimney-stacks
And ancient courtyards, soft
Blue smoke was breathed amongst the trees;
Dazzling clouds moved aloft;
Here, in the window where he stood
A cherry stretched its limb,
Half the diaphanous clusters clear
Enlumined, and half dim.
Green swift immortal Spring was here—
Spring in her lovely trim—
And whether it were ship or no,
The Earth seemed good to him.
Had he been Greek, or nurtured well
In lore of sages gone,
He would have felt her like that ship
Ascribed to Hieron,
Which, beside its deck-house luxuries
Of baths and bronzes fine,
Carried a pergola's green walk,
Shade-galleries of vine,
For awnings, fruit-espaliers
From buried urns in line.

Quitting the Inn, he made for home;
By many a cobbled wynd
Behung with mariner's wares, uphill
He strode with seething mind.
Above in the shady market-place
Unwonted silence reigned.
Under their patched umbrella stalls
Few flower-sellers remained;
But one, with old face like a map
Wrinkled by good and evil hap,
Stretched forth her palm. It rained.
Ah, yes, it rained—sudden acold
The sky loured overcast.
Soon pavements leapt with plashing drops;
And as he hasty passed
He heard a burst of chanted sound,
And glanced up at the vast
Shadow that over huddled roofs
Loomed, pinnacled and grey. . . .
The spired cathedral thunderously
And widely seemed to sway;
Like Earth upon her pilgrimage
Buffeting on from age to age,
It still was under way.

And on he trudged with peace at heart,
Rain pelting on his cheek,
But the shower half-ceased before he found
The bourn he seemed to seek,

A small house in a by-way dark
Beneath that April cloud,
And nigh the doorway he looked up
Keen-eyed. He could have vowed,
Yes, 'twas his wife stood shining there,
Yonder, where lintels dripped!
With soft, profound, familiar look
Low-laughing forth she slipped.

Her mute nod warned him (while her hair
Released bright drops that fell)
And bade him watch, but not disturb
A happy spectacle.
Now vapour'd were the cobble-stones;
The runnel where they stood
Fleeted adown the middle street,
Rays gleaming on its mud,
When lo! he saw a child, their son,
Squatted beside the flood,

The city's sole inhabitant
And lost to aught beside.
Wholly absorbed, aloof, intent;
Upon that ruffling tide

The boy embarked a faery ship
Of paper, white and gay;
And watched, with grave ecstatic smile,
Its glories whirled away.