'A coeur blesse -- l'ombre et le silence.' -- H. DE BALZAC. I I DREW it from its china tomb; -- It came out feebly scented With some thin ghost of past perfume That dust and days had lent it. An old, old letter, -- folded still! To read with due composure, I sought the sun-lit window-sill, Above the grey enclosure, That glimmering in the sultry haze, Faint-flowered, dimly shaded, Slumbered like Goldsmith's Madam Blaize, Bedizened and brocaded. A queer old place! You'd surely say Some tea-board garden-maker Had planned it in Dutch William's day To please some florist Quaker, So trim it was. The yew-trees still, With pious care perverted, Grew in the same grim shapes; and still The lipless dolphin spurted; Still in his wonted state abode The broken-nosed Apollo; And still the cypress-arbour showed The same umbrageous hollow. Only, -- as fresh young Beauty gleams From coffee-coloured laces, -- So peeped from its old-fashioned dreams The fresher modern traces; For idle mallet, hoop, and ball Upon the lawn were lying; A magazine, a tumbled shawl, Round which the swifts were flying; And, tossed beside the Guelder rose, A heap of rainbow knitting, Where, blinking in her pleased repose, A Persian cat was sitting. 'A place to love in, -- live, -- for aye, If we too, like Tithonus, Could find some god to stretch the grey, Scant life the Fates have thrown us; 'But now by steam we run our race, With buttoned heart and pocket; Our Love's a gilded, surplus grace, -- Just like an empty locket! '"The time is out of joint." Who will May strive to make it better; For me, this warm old window-sill, And this old dusty letter.' | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...A NEW HYMN by KATHERINE MANSFIELD TO W.P.: 2 by GEORGE SANTAYANA MY LADY'S TEARS by JOHN DOWLAND THE KISS by WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR RIDDLE: SEWING NEEDLE AND THREAD by MOTHER GOOSE THE CHILD ALONE: 7. THE LAND OF STORY-BOOKS by ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON A FAERY SONG, SUNG BY THE PEOPLE OF FAERY OVER DIARMUID by WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS |