 | English Roses |  |
306
THE BLUE HOURS
When the midnight now is over, and the shy excursive mouse
Deems it safe to be a rover in the silence of the house,
With the pitter and the patter of uneducated matter
Not afraid of pussy's grip,
And the usual merry cricket from the dim and dusty thicket
Of the ashes tunes his pipe;
And the heavy chair and table seem to move to secret song
Or the sofa grows unstable as if darkly drawn along,
With a creaking and a squeaking at the touch of viewless hands
And a rustling and a bustling of invisible commands;
When a host of crooked creatures with their surreptitious features,
From the hearth behind the stone
Come with furtive speech and sprawling and a creeping and a crawling—
Then I love to be alone.
Deems it safe to be a rover in the silence of the house,
With the pitter and the patter of uneducated matter
Not afraid of pussy's grip,
And the usual merry cricket from the dim and dusty thicket
Of the ashes tunes his pipe;
And the heavy chair and table seem to move to secret song
Or the sofa grows unstable as if darkly drawn along,
With a creaking and a squeaking at the touch of viewless hands
And a rustling and a bustling of invisible commands;
When a host of crooked creatures with their surreptitious features,
From the hearth behind the stone
Come with furtive speech and sprawling and a creeping and a crawling—
Then I love to be alone.
When the wall's familiar staining takes a sad and serious hue,
Or the shadows want explaining and the gas lights all burn blue;
While the depths within the doorway look as far and strange as Norway,
And the pictures seem to point
At the shapes as shy as mourners huddled in the distant corners,
And the room is out of joint;
When the solidest of timber fidgets as if fain to dance,
And the very tongs unlimber with a noise unknown to chance;
While a hopping and a flopping from the passages and stairs,
Rise like chidden and forbidden sounds, and from the blackest lairs;
When the turning keys and handles seem unlocking hushed-up scandals
For which nothing can atone,
And the lamp begins to sputter and the wind to moan and mutter—
Then I love to be alone.
Or the shadows want explaining and the gas lights all burn blue;
While the depths within the doorway look as far and strange as Norway,
And the pictures seem to point
At the shapes as shy as mourners huddled in the distant corners,
And the room is out of joint;
When the solidest of timber fidgets as if fain to dance,
And the very tongs unlimber with a noise unknown to chance;
While a hopping and a flopping from the passages and stairs,
Rise like chidden and forbidden sounds, and from the blackest lairs;
307
For which nothing can atone,
And the lamp begins to sputter and the wind to moan and mutter—
Then I love to be alone.
When the sense that I am haunted by a Thing I cannot see
Comes, and courage widely vaunted is no longer calm and free;
And a horror not unpleasant that a mystery is present,
Stepping more and still more near,
With a sort of icy shudder shakes the will from off its rudder
In a grim delightful fear;
As the swaying swelling curtain has a queer suggestive look,
And the outlines are uncertain of the most decided nook;
While a knocking and a rocking which I really cannot place,
Vie with sweeping of unsleeping robes that walk through empty space;
When a movement growing crisper to an universal whisper,
That no draughts may quite condone,
Wakes with trailing as of shackles and a foot of fire that crackles—
Then I love to be alone.
Comes, and courage widely vaunted is no longer calm and free;
And a horror not unpleasant that a mystery is present,
Stepping more and still more near,
With a sort of icy shudder shakes the will from off its rudder
In a grim delightful fear;
As the swaying swelling curtain has a queer suggestive look,
And the outlines are uncertain of the most decided nook;
While a knocking and a rocking which I really cannot place,
Vie with sweeping of unsleeping robes that walk through empty space;
When a movement growing crisper to an universal whisper,
That no draughts may quite condone,
Wakes with trailing as of shackles and a foot of fire that crackles—
Then I love to be alone.
When the keen and quickened pulses tell me by an instinct true
Awful knowledge that convulses, and the air itself turns blue;
And the ghosts of buried vices by a glamour that entices
Memory from solemn caves,
With a gaunt accusing gesture, veiled in cerements as vesture,
Start from their forgotten graves;
When the sins and all the errors of the never-dying past,
Clothed in dumb delicious terrors, serpent-wise round me are cast;
And the nameless thoughts and shameless which seem proper to the hour,
With a quiver and a shiver clutch me in their ghastly power;
And the reason now relenting with a criminal consenting
Bears me to the Astral Zone,
And each fancy out of fable mixes Bedlam up with Babel—
Then I love to be alone.
Awful knowledge that convulses, and the air itself turns blue;
And the ghosts of buried vices by a glamour that entices
Memory from solemn caves,
With a gaunt accusing gesture, veiled in cerements as vesture,
308
When the sins and all the errors of the never-dying past,
Clothed in dumb delicious terrors, serpent-wise round me are cast;
And the nameless thoughts and shameless which seem proper to the hour,
With a quiver and a shiver clutch me in their ghastly power;
And the reason now relenting with a criminal consenting
Bears me to the Astral Zone,
And each fancy out of fable mixes Bedlam up with Babel—
Then I love to be alone.
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