HER voice was tender as a lullaby, Making you think of milk-white dews that creep Among th' mid-May violets, when they lie, All in yellow moonlight fast asleep. Aye, tender as that most melodious tone The lark has, when within some covert dim With leaves, he talks with morning all alone, Persuading her to rise and come to him. Shy in her ways; her father's cattle knew -- No neighbor half so well -- her footstep light, For by the pond where mint and mallows grew Always she came and called them home at night. A sad, low pond that cut the field in two Wherein they ran, and never billow sent To play with any breeze, but still with-drew Into itself, in wrinkled, dull content. And here, through mint and mallows she would stray, Musing the while she called, as it might be On th' cold clouds, or winds that with rough gray Shingled the landward slope of the near sea. God knows! not I, on what she mused o' nights Straying about the pond: she had no woe To think upon, they said, nor such de-lights As maids are wont to hide. I only know We do not know the weakness or the worth Of any one: th' Sun as he will may trim His golden lights; he cannot see the earth He loves, but on the side she turns to him. I only know that when this lonesome pond Lifted the buried lilies from its breast One warm, wet day (I nothing know beyond), It lifted her white face up with the rest. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...FRAGMENT 113 by HILDA DOOLITTLE THEOLOGY by PAUL LAURENCE DUNBAR THE WHITE HOUSE by CLAUDE MCKAY THE HIGHWAYMAN by ALFRED NOYES RAISING THE DEVIL; A LEGEND OF CORNELIUS AGRIPPA by RICHARD HARRIS BARHAM THE FISHERMAN by GAMALIEL BRADFORD THE WANDERER: 5. IN HOLLAND: A NIGHT IN THE FISHERMAN'S HUT by EDWARD ROBERT BULWER-LYTTON |