Edna St. Vincent Millay

        The railroad track is miles away,
            And the day is loud with voices speaking,
        Yet there isn't a train goes by all day
            But I hear its whistle shrieking.

        All night there isn't a train goes by,
            Though the night is still for sleep and dreaming
        But I see its cinders red on the sky,
            And hear its engine steaming.

        My heart is warm with the friends I make,
            And better friends I'll not be knowing,
        Yet there isn't a train I wouldn't take,
            No matter where it's going.

        White with daisies and red with sorrel
            And empty, empty under the sky!--
        Life is a quest and love a quarrel--
            Here is a place for me to lie.

        Daisies spring from damned seeds,
            And this red fire that here I see
        Is a worthless crop of crimson weeds,
            Cursed by farmers thriftily.

        But here, unhated for an hour,
            The sorrel runs in ragged flame,
        The daisy stands, a bastard flower,
            Like flowers that bear an honest name.

        And here a while, where no wind brings
            The baying of a pack athirst,
        May sleep the sleep of blessed things,
            The blood too bright, the brow accurst.

    I cannot but remember
        When the year grows old--
    October--November--
        How she disliked the cold!

    She used to watch the swallows
        Go down across the sky,
    And turn from the window
        With a little sharp sigh.

    And often when the brown leaves
        Were brittle on the ground,
    And the wind in the chimney
        Made a melancholy sound,

    She had a look about her
        That I wish I could forget--
    The look of a scared thing
        Sitting in a net!

    Oh, beautiful at nightfall
        The soft spitting snow!
    And beautiful the bare boughs
        Rubbing to and fro!

    But the roaring of the fire,
        And the warmth of fur,
    And the ...

        I looked in my heart while the wild swans went over.
        And what did I see I had not seen before?
        Only a question less or a question more;
        Nothing to match the flight of wild birds flying.
        Tiresome heart, forever living and dying,
        House without air, I leave you and lock your door.
        Wild swans, come over the town, come over
        The town again, trailing your legs and crying!

    She is neither pink nor pale,
        And she never will be all mine;
    She learned her hands in a fairy-tale,
        And her mouth on a valentine.

    She has more hair than she needs;
        In the sun 'tis a woe to me!
    And her voice is a string of colored beads,
    Or steps leading into the sea.

    She loves me all that she can,
        And her ways to my ways resign;
    But she was not made for any man,
        And she never will be all mine.

        "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,
            An...