Page:Poems Eckley.djvu/100

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86
Lady Clarisse.
So ghostly that the shadows fail to mock it as they glide,
So back to the rents in the gable they flit away to hide,
Rather than fling a shadow on the footsteps of a bride.

But why wanders lady Clarisse in the dark and shrouded night?
Why rests she not in slumber 'neath her curtain's rosy light?
Why flitteth she like Banshee round the battlements to-night?

Lady Clarisse! Lady Clarisse! by the ring upon thy hand,
By the garland of white jessamine up-braided in the band
That encircles thy fair forehead,—O, wherefore dost thou stand

Gazing into lurid darkness, like a restless spirit sent
To chase the vagrant echoes as they answer from the rent
Where the spider only, loves to pitch her secret tent?