 | Poems and Sonnets |  |
31
WHAT SHALL I DO?
I
What shall I do when music fades away,When silence occupies the world of things,
And not a throat of any throstle sings,
And not a single sunset but is gray,
When blue forsakes the summer, and to day
And night a sodden robe of fog-damp clings,
And never a rosy dream the twilight brings,
And not a sonnet has a word to say?
What shall I do when these things come to pass,
When moons are mute, and all the stars are pale,
And ever, as the winter rushes wail
And shiver at the East wind stalks of grass,
I tremble, fingers powerless alas!
To make my loosened harp-strings of avail?
32
II
What shall I do when all these things are mine?A love that was in summer, and instead
The frozen pallor of a wintry head,
A wreath of meadow-sweet I used to twine,
But now of icicles a lengthy line,
And pale snow-berries for the golden-red
Fruit of the mountain chesnut, and a dead
White waste of foam, a scentless field of brine,
For sweet green waters, and for flowers tears,
And fervour barrenness, and fire cold,
And roses of the summer some sad old
And wrinkled dowager rose of later years,
For softest orange-blossoms square-cut biers,
And for forget-me-not a corpse to hold?
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