Classic Poem

Come to the haunted palace of my dreams,
My crumbling palace by the eternal sea,
Which, like a childless mother, still must croon
Her ancient sorrows to the cold white moon,
Or, ebbing tremulously,
With one pale arm, where the long foam-fringe gleams,
Will gather her rustling garments, for a space
Of muffled weeping, round her dim white face.

A princess dwelt here once: long, long ago
This tower rose in the sunset like a prayer;
And, through the witchery of that casement, rolled
In one soft cataract of faëry gold
Her wonder-woven hair;
Her face leaned out and took the sacred glow
Of evening, like the star that listened, high
Above the gold clouds of the western sky.

Was there no prince behind her in the gloom,
No crimson shadow of his rich array?
Her face leaned down to me: I saw the tears
Bleed through her eyes with the slow pain of years,
And her mouth yearned to say--
"Friend, is there any message, from the tomb
Where love lies buried?" But she only said--
"Oh, friend, canst thou not save me from my dead?

"Canst thou not minister to a soul in pain?
Or hast thou then no comfortable word?
Is there no faith in thee wherewith to atone
For his unfaith who left me here alone,
Heart-sick with hope deferred;
Oh, since my love will never come again,
Bring'st thou no respite through the desolate years,
Respite from these most unavailing tears?"

Then saw I, and mine own tears made response,
Her woman's heart come breaking through her eyes;
And, as I stood beneath the tower's grey wall,
She let the soft waves of her deep hair fall
Like flowers from Paradise
Over my fevered face: then all at once
Pity was passion; and like a sea of bliss
Those waves rolled o'er me drowning for her kiss.

* * * *

Seven years we dwelt together in that tower,
Seven years in that old palace by the sea,
And sitting at that casement, side by side,
She told me all her pain: how love had died
Now for all else but me;
Yet how she had loved that other: like a flower
Her red lips parted and with low sweet moan
She pressed their tender suffering on mine own.

And always with vague eyes she gazed afar,
Out through the casement o'er the changing tide;
And slowly was my heart's hope brought to nought
That some day I should win each wandering thought
And make her my soul's bride:
Still, still she gazed across the cold sea-bar;
Ay; with her hand in mine, still, still and pale,
Waited and watched for the unreturning sail.

And I, too, watched and waited as the years
Rolled on; and slowly was I brought to feel
How on my lips she met her lover's kiss,
How my heart's pulse begat an alien bliss;
And cold and hard as steel
For me those eyes were, though their tender tears
Were salt upon my cheek; and then one night
I saw a sail come through the pale moonlight.

And like an alien ghost I stole away,
And like a breathing lover he returned;
And in the woods I dwelt, or sometimes crept
Out in the grey dawn while the lovers slept
And the great sea-tides yearned
Against the iron shores; and faint and grey
The tower and the shut casement rose above:
And on the earth I sobbed out all my love.

At last, one royal rose-hung night in June,
When the warm air like purple Hippocrene
Brimmed the dim valley and sparkled into stars,
I saw them cross the foam-lit sandy bars
And dark pools, glimmering green,
To bathe beneath the honey-coloured moon:
I saw them swim out from that summer shore,
Kissed by the sea, but they returned no more.

* * * *

And into the dark palace, like a dream
Remembered after long oblivious years,
Through the strange open doors I crept and saw
As some poor pagan might, with reverent awe,
And deep adoring tears,
The moonlight through that painted window stream
Over the soft wave of their vacant bed;
There sank I on my knees and bowed my head,

For as a father by a cradle bows,
Remembering two dead children of his own,
I knelt; and by the cry of the great deep
Their love seemed like a murmuring in their sleep,
A little fevered moan,
A little tossing of childish arms that shows
How dreams go by! "If I were God," I wept,
"I would have pity on children while they slept."

* * * *

The days, the months, the years drift over me;
This is my habitation till I die:
Nothing is changed; they left that open book
Beside the window. Did he sit and look
Up at her face as I
Looked while she read it, and the enchanted sea
With rich eternities of love unknown
Fulfilled the low sweet music of her tone?

So did he listen, looking in her face?
And did she ever pause, remembering so
The heart that bore the whole weight of her pain
Until her own heart's love returned again?
In the still evening glow
I sit and listen in this quiet place,
And only hear--like notes of phantom birds--
Their perished kisses and little broken words.

Come to the haunted palace of my dreams,
My crumbling palace by the eternal sea,
Which, like a childless mother, still must croon
Her ancient sorrows to the cold white moon,
Or, ebbing tremulously,
With one pale arm, where the long foam-fringe gleams,
Will gather her rustling garments, for a space
Of muffled weeping, round her dim white face.