The street to-night is empty,
And the last slow footstep gone;
The windows grow darker and darker,
And I am left alone.
And I stand and hear the whisper
Of the breeze that along the street
Comes, pausing by each dim doorway
Like some magician's feet;
While far away, from the river,
Comes a low dread sound that seems
Like the warning we heart at midnight
When the dead take a part in our dreams.
So in the hush of this night-time,
When the better thoughts arise,
I turn from the past to the future
With a softer light in my eyes.
For I feel no more within me
The old dead thoughts that came
In the earlier years, and pointed
To the wreath and the poet's name.
But I think of the dead who slumber,
From the care and the sorrow free;
And I whisper as soft as the night wind—
'They are better far than me.'
For they teach me this life is nothing
But a bubble from the first,
Blown out by some cunning spirit
For the hand of death to burst.
Then what do we toil and strive for
In this world, still torn and vex'd,
But to show that our faiths are selfish,
And have no belief in the next?
I look, and the stars above me
Beam on in their strength and truth,
And smile and watch over the village
With looks of eternal youth.
I watch in the great wide heaven
Their changing lustre play,
Till the old soul sinks in my bosom,
Like night at approach of day.
But I doubt again, and I whisper,
'O stars, that above me shine,
Will the thoughts that are with me this night-time
Ever follow this life of mine?'
Then they wane, and they dance, and they flicker,
And by this at once I know
That this life is a flux and reflux,
Till the dust is laid below.
So I turn from the street with a sadness
Creeping upward within the breast,
To think that the better purpose
Is so fickle to the test;
And that the calm of this night time,
Soothing all like a summer rain,
Is but as a lull in the tempest
Which to-morrow will wake again.