Bright baffling Soul, least capturable of themes,

         Thou, who display’dst a life of common-place,

         Leaving no intimate word or personal trace

         Of high design outside the artistry

            Of thy penned dreams,

      Still shalt remain at heart unread eternally.

         Through human orbits thy discourse to-day,

         Despite thy formal pilgrimage, throbs on

         In harmonies that cow Oblivion,

         And, like the wind, with all-uncared effect

            Maintain a sway

      Not fore-desired, in tracks unchosen and unchecked.

         And yet, at thy last breath, with mindless note

         The borough clocks but samely tongued the hour,

         The Avon just as always glassed the tower,

         Thy age was published on thy passing-bell

            But in due rote

      With other dwellers’ deaths accorded a like knell.

         And at the strokes some townsman (met, maybe,

         And thereon queried by some squire’s good dame

         Driving in shopward) may have given thy name,

         With, “Yes, a worthy man and well-to-do;

            Though, as for me,

      I knew him but by just a neighbour’s nod, ’tis true.

         “I’ faith, few knew him much here, save by word,

         He having elsewhere led his busier life;

         Though to be sure he left with us his wife.”

         – “Ah, one of the tradesmen’s sons, I now recall.

            Witty, I’ve heard.

      We did not know him.. Well, good-day.  Death comes to all.”

         So, like a strange bright bird we sometimes find

         To mingle with the barn-door brood awhile,

         Then vanish from their homely domicile —

         Into man’s poesy, we wot not whence,

            Flew thy strange mind,

      Lodged there a radiant guest, and sped for ever thence.

      When I weekly knew

      An ancient pew,

      And murmured there

      The forms of prayer

      And thanks and praise

      In the ancient ways,

      And heard read out

      During August drought

      That chapter from Kings

      Harvest-time brings;

      – How the prophet, broken

      By griefs unspoken,

      Went heavily away

      To fast and to pray,

      And, while waiting to die,

      The Lord passed by,

      And a whirlwind and fire

      Drew nigher and nigher,

      And a small voice anon

      Bade him up and be gone, —

      I did not apprehend

      As I sat to the end

      And watched for her smile

      Across the sunned aisle,

      That this tale of a seer

      Which came once a year

      Might, when sands were heaping,

      Be like a sweat creeping,

      Or in any degree

      Bear on her or on me!

      When later, by chance

      Of circumstance,

      It befel me to read

      On a hot afternoon

      At the lectern there

      The selfsame words

      As the lesson decreed,

      To the gathered few

      From the hamlets near —

      Folk of flocks and herds

      Sitting half aswoon,

      Who listened thereto

      As women and men

      Not overmuch

      Concerned at such —

      So, like them then,

      I did not see

      What drought might be

      With me, with her,

      As the Kalendar

      Moved on, and Time

      Devoured our prime.

      But now, at last,

      When our glory has passed,

      And there is no smile

      From