We are the puppets of a shadow-play, We dream the plot is woven of our hearts, Passionately we play the self-same parts Our fathers have played passionately yesterday, And our sons play to-morrow. There's no speech In all desire, nor any idle word, Men have not said and women have not heard; And when we lean and whisper each to each Until the silence quickens to a kiss, Even so the actor and the actress played The lovers yesterday; when the lights fade Before our feet, and the obscure abyss Opens, and darkness falls about our eyes, 'Tis only that some momentary rage Or rapture blinds us to forget the stage, Like the wise actor, most in this thing wise. We pass, and have our gesture; love and pain And hope and apprehension and regret Weave ordered lines into a pattern set Not for our pleasure, and for us in vain. The gesture is eternal; we who pass Pass on the gesture; we, who pass, pass on One after one into oblivion, As shadows dim and vanish from a glass. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...A WOMAN'S QUESTION by ADELAIDE ANNE PROCTER A CHRISTMAS CAROL (1) by CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI FELISE by ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE THE KNIGHTS: DEMOS REJUVENATED by ARISTOPHANES THE COACHMAN'S YARN by EDWIN JAMES BRADY |