The Widow
She hath no children, and no heart
In all our hurrying anxious life;
She sits beyond our ken apart,
Unmoved, unconscious of our strife;
Shipwrecked beyond these coasts of ours.
On some sad island full of flowers
Where nothing moves but memory;
Where no one lives but only he;
And all we others barely seem
The phantom figures of a dream
One dreams and says, "It cannot be!"
If sometimes when we talk with her
Those absent eyes light up awhile
And her set lips consent to stir
In the beginning of a smile.
It is not of our world nor us
But some remembrance tremulous,
Some sweet "Ten years ago to-day!"
Or haply, if a sudden ray
Set all her window in a glow.
She thinks: "'Twill make the roses blow
I planted at his feet to-day."
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