In Memoriam J. V. C

I

THE SHADOW CAME

The Shadow came;

All the gentle, grieving quiet

Trembled with her name.

Dark is her door;

Calls and calls the grieving quiet,

Answered nevermore.

II

AT A GRAVE

Beckoned the Comer Dim,

And she must follow him

To that far field whence summer never goes,

But ever on the rose-tree dreams the rose.

To earth she was so dear,

All pure things linger near,

As if she still were here;

The grasses, glad

With motion once she had,

Stir them and wave

Upon her grave.

III

BY THE WESTERN SEA

The circling sea-birds to the ledge have flown,

The sun is sinking in the western sea;

'T is not the loneliness nor yet the moan

Makes this far shore so full of pain for me.

I could be still the while these waves beat on,

I could have comfort of this wild unrest,

But for a radiant spirit, faded, gone,

Like the soft color lost, now, in the west.

The solitary dusk, the troubled wave,

The wind, the growing sorrow of the deep,

These would not hurt my heart but for the grave

Here, where they left her when she fell asleep.

I stand beside it, and I feel her hands

Reach to me. Oh, these lone, unknowing sands!

IV

ASLEEP IN THE WEST

They led her East, they led her West,

She followed where they led;

The way, it ran toward rest,

The one untroubled bed.

To her pale cheek the color came,

Whether on hill or wave, —

The flower with brighter flame

The nearer to the grave.

They led her East, they led her West,

She followed meek and still;

The way, it ran toward rest —

She sleeps upon the hill.

Sometimes I think that Nature knows, —

Her native western skies,

The warm wind and the rose

Remember where she lies.