I SHOULD not have shown in the flesh, I ought to have gone as a ghost; It was awkward, unseemly almost, Standing solidly there as when fresh, Pink, tiny, crisp-curled, My pinions yet furled From the winds of the world. After waiting so many a year To wait longer, and go as a sprite From the tomb at the mid of some night Was the right, radiant way to appear; Not as one wanzing weak From life's roar and reek, His rest still to seek: Yea, beglimpsed through the quaint quarried glass Of green moonlight, by me greener made, When they'd cry, perhaps, 'There sits his shade In his olden haunt - just as he was When in Walkingame he Conned the grand Rule-of-Three With the bent of a bee.' But to show in the afternoon sun, With an aspect of hollow-eyed care, When none wished to see me come there, Was a garish thing, better undone. Yes; wrong was the way; But yet, let me say, I may right it - some day. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...COMPLAINT by WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS YOUTH AND CUPID by ELIZABETH I EVENING HYMN by REGINALD HEBER SENCE YOU WENT AWAY by JAMES WELDON JOHNSON PETER QUINCE AT THE CLAVIER by WALLACE STEVENS TO THE SKYLARK by BERNARD BARTON |