Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE GREEN LADY, by KATHARINE TYNAN


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE GREEN LADY, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Grey spring twilight, the mild light, the shy light
Last Line: Comes and goes like a mist of green, a gentle ghost.
Alternate Author Name(s): Hinkson, Katharine Tynan
Subject(s): Green (color); Spring


GREY Spring twilight, the mild light, the shy light,
Larks, finches, linnets, all wild with glee.
The blackbird's shouting, without fear or doubting:
Nothing's dead and nothing's lost: Look up and see!

Thrushes are spilling their gold rain, filling
The yet bare arches of the wood with wild delight.
But who is this Lady bids the world make ready
For love-feasts and lovers and the scented night?

Oh, who is this Lady? By covert shady,
By orchard and garden her foot will steal:
A sweet, sweet shadow, by hill and meadow,
Tells her tale to the hid vale, the listening hill.

She comes all unbidden, with wild eyes hidden;
Veils of mist cover her with a green dress.
Where her foot passes, the dead under the grasses
Ask: Is it time? And she answers: Yes.

I have not seen her, but the grass is greener
For the white feet of her that glide and float.
I but divine her by a something finer,
Wilder and gayer in the blackbird's note.

She's a heavenly presence by park and pleasance,
In the grey twilight a presence dear.
Half apprehended, by the choir attended,
Her gown of the green silk laps at my ear.

To my highest chamber her white feet clamber.
Oh, the Spring, the Spring's in my house and joys I lost.
In the grey twilight, the soft light, the shy light,
Comes and goes like a mist of green, a gentle ghost.





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