The Woman I Met

A stranger, I threaded sunken-hearted
&nbsp       &nbsp A lamp-lit crowd;
And anon there passed me a soul departed,
&nbsp       &nbsp Who mutely bowed.
In my far-off youthful years I had met her,
Full-pulsed; but now, no more life’s debtor,
&nbsp       &nbsp Onward she slid
&nbsp In a shroud that furs half-hid.

“Why do you trouble me, dead woman,
&nbsp       &nbsp Trouble me;
You whom I knew when warm and human?
&nbsp       &nbsp - How it be
That you quitted earth and are yet upon it
Is, to any who ponder on it,
&nbsp       &nbsp Past being read!”
&nbsp “Still, it is so,” she said.

“These were my haunts in my olden sprightly
&nbsp       &nbsp Hours of breath;
Here I went tempting frail youth nightly
&nbsp       &nbsp To their death;
But you deemed me chaste - me, a tinselled sinner!
How thought you one with pureness in her
&nbsp       &nbsp Could pace this street
&nbsp Eyeing some man to greet?

“Well; your very simplicity made me love you
&nbsp       &nbsp Mid such town dross,
Till I set not Heaven itself above you,
&nbsp       &nbsp Who grew my Cross;
For you’d only nod, despite how I sighed for you;
So you tortured me, who fain would have died for you!
&nbsp       &nbsp - What I suffered then
&nbsp Would have paid for the sins of ten!

“Thus went the days. I feared you despised me
&nbsp       &nbsp To fling me a nod
Each time, no more: till love chastised me
&nbsp       &nbsp As with a rod
That a fresh bland boy of no assurance
Should fire me with passion beyond endurance,
&nbsp       &nbsp While others all
&nbsp I hated, and loathed their call.

“I said: ‘It is his mother’s spirit
&nbsp       &nbsp Hovering around
To shield him, maybe!’ I used to fear it,
&nbsp       &nbsp As still I found
My beauty left no least impression,
And remnants of pride withheld confession
&nbsp       &nbsp Of my true trade
&nbsp By speaking; so I delayed.

“I said: ‘Perhaps with a costly flower
&nbsp       &nbsp He’ll be beguiled.’
I held it, in passing you one late hour,
&nbsp       &nbsp To your face: you smiled,
Keeping step with the throng; though you did not see there
A single one that rivalled me there! . . .
&nbsp       &nbsp Well: it’s all past.
&nbsp I died in the Lock at last.”

So walked the dead and I together
&nbsp       &nbsp The quick among,
Elbowing our kind of every feather
&nbsp       &nbsp Slowly and long;
Yea, long and slowly. That a phantom should stalk there
With me seemed nothing strange, and talk there
&nbsp       &nbsp That winter night
&nbsp By flaming jets of light.

She showed me Juans who feared their call-time,
&nbsp       &nbsp Guessing their lot;
She showed me her sort that cursed their fall-time,
&nbsp       &nbsp And that did not.
Till suddenly murmured she: “Now, tell me,
Why asked you never, ere death befell me,
&nbsp       &nbsp To have my love,
&nbsp Much as I dreamt thereof?”

I could not answer. And she, well weeting
&nbsp       &nbsp All in my heart,
Said: “God your guardian kept our fleeting
&nbsp       &nbsp Forms apart!”
Sighing and drawing her furs around her
Over the shroud that tightly bound her,
&nbsp       &nbsp With wafts as from clay
&nbsp She turned and thinned away.