Once it was in my life’s beginning, Roses were tall in their summer beds, Dandelions within my fingers Thrust their confident golden heads; Wading waist-deep ’mid the daisies, Feeling the grasses about me climb-- Thus it was in my life’s beginning; What have you done to me, Father Time?
So shall it be when life has ended: Roses shall bloom above my head, Dandelions will know I am lying Hidden in grass from foot to head. Hidden in grass and hidden in daisies, Over my breast I shall feel them climb, Thus it will be when life has ended; This will you do to me, Father Time.
The Weariness of Idleness, She waited all the day In the parlor of her neighbor, The Weariness of Labor-- A visit she had long meant to pay.
But not until the evening Did her hostess come in sight; Then the Weariness of Labor Explained unto her neighbor That she lived but a brief hour at night.
Red curtains shut the storm from sight, The inner rooms are live with light; The fireside faces all aglow See not the pale ghost in the snow, The pale ghost at the window pressed, With the wind moaning in her breast.
She sees the face she hurt with scorn, The other face where joy, new born, Died out at her cheap mockery; The eyes she filled, how bitterly! The head that drooped beneath her jest-- The wind is moaning in her breast.
Invisible, unfelt, unknown, She lingers trembling. She alone Notes tenderly her vacant place, And sees in it her vanished face; She only--of this happy nest! The wind is moaning in her breast.
Star-like the happy windows glow, Framed in with mile on mile of snow; And from their light a thing of death, Of grief and memory vanisheth, Her sin not deep but unredressed, And the wind moaning in her breast.
A generous gentleness that flowed, Stream-like, beside a dusty road; Gave laborers shade, and prisoners sun, And easeful joy to every one; With liquid melodies for such As worked or wearied overmuch, And ministrations cool and sweet For fevered hands and aching feet.
So delicately fair she moved-- That stream-like girl, of all beloved. Along her path no grief nor care But lulled and lightened unaware. She bore the sky within her breast, And child-like winds her soul caressed, Until her spring of life was dried, And with a smile Philippa died.