New Warnings came: secure in her new life, She told me of her olden search for death Thrice thwarted by her father, when with breath Thrice choked in foamy agony of strife Under the summer waters off our pier, Thrice had she felt his hand on matted hair, Been thrice recalled, as he put forth a hand Over the gunwale, to love and longer here Among the living, with love not anywhere -- Thrice in the years ere I had come inland. Yes, from her story a new Warning came Of impulse ineradicable and sure: And Death to her was still a shining lure (Though hid awhile), as for the moth the flame. |