The Trance

The Moon is beautiful this night:

She is so clear and bright,

That should she smile

On any sleeping face awhile,

The eyes must then their slumber break,

And open, wide awake;

And should she pass a sleeping bird,

Where no leaves touch or meet,

He’ll wake and, in his softest voice,

Cry Sweet! Sweet! Sweet!

The Moon is beautiful, but who is this

That hides his face from hers;

That, when she makes eyes through the leaves,

Is full of trembling fears?

The night breeds many a ting that’s strange:

The wretched owl that in distress

Hoots every star that comes to help

The evening in her loveliness;

The half-blind bats that here and there

Are floundering in the twilight air;

The rat, that shows his long white teeth

Of hard, unbreakable bone-

That take him where his notions go,

Through wood and lead, cement and stone;

And cats, that have the power,

About the midnight hour,

To hide their bodies’ size

Behind two small green eyes.

The night has these- but who is this

That like a shadow glides

Across the shadows of the trees,

And his own visage hides?

He hides his face- we wonder what

That face would look like in the sun:

Perhaps an ugly bloated thing

That has more heavy chins than one;

Or is it sharp and white and thin,

With a long nose that tries to hook

Almost as sharp a chin-

And with a cold, hard, cruel look?

We cannot say, but this is sure-

If we this night saw it,

We’d rush to strike that monster down,

To drown him in our common spit.

            *          *          *

This morning, when the blackbird near

Was frightened from his thirteenth song,

There was a lady buried here-

A lady, beautiful and young.

And all the rings she wore in life,

As one betrothed and as a wife,

Were left upon her fingers still,

According to her living will.

But there was one who thought and thought,

Until one thought possessed his head;

And now he goes, though full of fear

Of that clear moon, to rob the dead.

I will not say

Whose beauty has less fault:

That lady, where she lay,

Or that fair moon outside,

That kissed the mouth of her black vault.

Oh god, it was a lovely sight:

She was so beautiful in death,

That, till her own looks pitied her,

No mortal could with living breath.

But what cared he for her fair face

When, by his lamp, in that dark place,

He saw the jewels there,

Shaking with life, and greedy, where

They nibbled at the small, gold bands

On her cold, lifeless hands:

But though he turns those rings around,

They make no downward move, when pulled,

To come from her white hand to his-

He’ll cut her fingers off for gold!

But ah, no sooner had he cut

One finger with his knife,

Than her white flesh, so firm and smooth,

Rippled with sudden life!

Now if a cobweb touched his face,

This moment, in that haunted place,

He would have fallen to the ground,

Caught in a net of steel, and bound;

A little leaf, dropped on his head,

Would be a bolt to strike him dead:

But when he heard the lady sigh,

And saw her body rising there,

A second fear released the first,

From stupor into active fear;

And when outside that vault again,

With space to use his trembling knees,

He ran and ran- nor thought of light,

Or shadows under trees.

The first thoughts of that lady

Were delicate and pure:

She looked to see if her fair body

Was covered well and sure;

Her second thoughts were home and love-

And quickly did that lady move.

Home to her husband, where that man,

In misery full and deep,

Kneels at an empty chair and sobs;

To her two little ones that sleep-

They are so small in size

That their sweet tender mouths are still

No bigger than their wondering eyes.

What joy, and what astonishment

For him, who suffers for her sake!

But the little ones will certainly

Expect their mother when they wake.