A DOGGREL IN A DORMANT-WINDOW
by: Joseph Sheridan Le
Fanu (1814-1873)
- MONG the
gray roofs nooked,
- As Chronos in the skies,
- Red chimneys, old and crook'd,
- Like headstones round me rise.
-
- The chimneys, crook'd and old,
- My neighbors in the air,
- Like gods of dingy gold,
- Bend sadly here and there.
-
- The crows to roost returning
- In their misty woods below--
- The hill-tops dimly burning
- In the sun's refracted glow--
-
- Like purple shadows sailing
- Across the sea-green sky,
- Like far waves hoarsely wailing
- Call dimly as they fly.
-
- My senses, sadly dreaming,
- Just hear and see them fly,
- Like bygone shadows streaming
- Along pale memory's sky.
-
- From the gray tower with its corbels,
- And its belfry arching fair,
- The mellow curfew warbles
- Its old tune on the air;
-
- It sails above me welling
- Like long soft summer waves,
- Still quivering on and swelling
- Across the village graves.
-
- My lattice open flies,
- The dewy evening air,
- Fresh from the starry skies,
- Just stirs my silvered hair.
-
- Come forth, my graceful pipe,
- My halfpenny pipe of clay,
- With Latachia rope
- We'll wile the hour away.
-
- Then musical by space,
- Up from the gloaming street
- Float sounds and songs apace,
- And random prattle sweet--
-
- Bold fellows laughing boldly
- With soft-tongued maidens near,
- Old people prating odly,
- And children's voices clear.
-
- And in their faint gradations,
- While changeless stars gleam o'er us,
- I hear three generations
- All chiming in one chorus.
-
- The twilight deepens fast,
- My pipe grows like a star,
- Or a distant smithy's blast,
- Or a lighthouse flash from afar.
-
- A lonely man am I,
- In my dormant-window thinking,
- So lowly, and so high,
- The dreamy vapour drinking.
-
- The vapour hangs and dozes,
- And the stars no more I see;
- The opening film discloses
- A loved pale face to me.
-
- The sad face smiling there,
- The young face as of yore,
- Inexorably fair,
- To speak or change no more.
-
- The brown hair is now gray,
- Of him you loved, but to
- Your lovely shadow years away
- His lonely heart beats true.
-
- And now my pipe is out,
- I drop it in the weeds,
- It served its little bout,
- And quietude succeeds.
-
- And when my glow is o'er,
- In ashes quenched by fire,
- When its fragrance is no more
- And spark and smoke expire;
-
- O'er me may some one say,
- As I, of you to-day,
- Beneath the nettles and the flowers
- Where lies my worn-out clay;
-
- He did in his allotted hours--
- What fellows sometimes shirk--
- In this enormous world of ours,
- His halfpenny-worth of work.
MORE POEMS BY JOSEPH SHERIDAN LE FANU |
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