Wraith

        "Thin Rain, whom are you haunting,
            That you haunt my door?"
        --Surely it is not I she's wanting;
            Someone living here before--
        "Nobody's in the house but me:
        You may come in if you like and see."

        Thin as thread, with exquisite fingers,--
            Have you seen her, any of you?--
        Grey shawl, and leaning on the wind,
            And the garden showing through?

        Glimmering eyes,--and silent, mostly,
            Sort of a whisper, sort of a purr,
        Asking something, asking it over,
            If you get a sound from her.--

        Ever see her, any of you?--
            Strangest thing I've ever known,--
        Every night since I moved in,
            And I came to be alone.

        "Thin Rain, hush with your knocking!
            You may not come in!
        This is I that you hear rocking;
            Nobody's with me, nor has been!"

        Curious, how she tried the window,--
            Odd, the way she tries the door,--
        Wonder just what sort of people
            Could have had this house before . . .

Edna St. Vincent Millay

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Edna St. Vincent Millay

Sonnets VIII

Edna St. Vincent Millay, Simple Poetry

City Trees

Edna St. Vincent Millay, Simple Poetry

Indifference

Edna St. Vincent Millay, Simple Poetry

Elegy Before Death

Edna St. Vincent Millay, Simple Poetry

English

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The Wraith

Ah me, it is cold and chill
And the fire sobs low in the grate,
While the wind rides by on the hill,
And the logs crack sharp with hate.

And she, she is cold and sad
As ever the sinful are,
But deep in my heart I am glad
For my wound and the coming scar.

Oh, ever the wind rides by
And ever the raindrops grieve;
But a voice like a woman's sigh
Says, "Do you believe, believe?"

Ah, you were warm and sweet,
Sweet as the May days be;
Down did I fall at your feet,
Why did you hearken to me?

Oh, the logs they crack and whine,
And the water drops from the eaves;
But it is not rain but brine
Where my dead darling grieves.

And a wraith sits by my side,
A spectre grim and dark;
Are you gazing here open-eyed

Paul Laurence Dunbar

Ode To Silence

            Aye, but she?
            Your other sister and my other soul
            Grave Silence, lovelier
            Than the three loveliest maidens, what of her?
            Clio, not you,
            Not you, Calliope,
            Nor all your wanton line,
            Not Beauty's perfect self shall comfort me
            For Silence once departed,
            For her the cool-tongued, her the tranquil-hearted,
            Whom evermore I follow wistfully,
        Wandering Heaven and Earth and Hell and the four seasons through;
        Thalia, not you,
        Not you, Melpomene,
        Not your incomparable feet, O thin Terpsichore,
        I seek in this great hall,
        But one more pale, more pensive, most beloved of you all.
        I se...

Edna St. Vincent Millay

The Haunted Chamber

Each heart has its haunted chamber,
    Where the silent moonlight falls!
On the floor are mysterious footsteps,
    There are whispers along the walls!

And mine at times is haunted
    By phantoms of the Past
As motionless as shadows
    By the silent moonlight cast.

A form sits by the window,
    That is not seen by day,
For as soon as the dawn approaches
    It vanishes away.

It sits there in the moonlight
    Itself as pale and still,
And points with its airy finger
    Across the window-sill.

Without before the window,
    There stands a gloomy pine,
Whose boughs wave upward and downward
    As wave these thoughts of mine.

And underneath its branches
    Is the grave of a little child,
Who died u...

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The Haunted Room.

Its casements' diamond disks of glass
Stare myriad on a terrace old,
Where urns, unkempt with ragged grass,
Foam o'er with frothy cold.
The snow rounds o'er each stair of stone;
The frozen fount is hooped with pearl;
Down desolate walks, like phantoms lone,
Thin, powd'ry snow-wreaths whirl.

And to each rose-tree's stem that bends
With silver snow-combs, glued with frost,
It seems each summer rosebud sends
Its airy, scentless ghost.
The stiff Elizabethan pile
Chatters with cold thro' all its panes,
And rumbling down each chimney file
The mad wind shakes his reins.

*    *    *    *    *    *    *

Lone in the Northern angle, dim
With immemorial dust, it lay,
Where each gaunt casement's stony rim
Stared lidless to the day.

Madison Julius Cawein

The Little Ghost

    I knew her for a little ghost
        That in my garden walked;
    The wall is high--higher than most--
        And the green gate was locked.

    And yet I did not think of that
        Till after she was gone--
    I knew her by the broad white hat,
        All ruffled, she had on.

    By the dear ruffles round her feet,
        By her small hands that hung
    In their lace mitts, austere and sweet,
        Her gown's white folds among.

    I watched to see if she would stay,
        What she would do--and oh!
    She looked as if she liked the way
        I let my garden grow!

    She bent above my favourite mint
        With conscious garden grace,
    She smiled and smiled--there was no hint
        Of sadness ...

Edna St. Vincent Millay

Haunted.

When grave the twilight settles o'er my roof,
And from the haggard oaks unto my door
The rain comes, wild as one who rides before
His enemies that follow, hoof to hoof;
And in each window's gusty curtain-woof
The rain-wind sighs, like one who mutters o'er
Some tale of love and crime; and, on the floor,
The sunset spreads red stains as bloody proof;
From hall to hall and stealthy stair to stair,
Through all the house, a dread that drags me toward
The ancient dusk of that avoided room,
Wherein she sits with ghostly golden hair,
And eyes that gaze beyond her soul's sad doom,
Bending above an unreal harpsichord.

Madison Julius Cawein