The Three Taverns | Page 5

our doors,?And had not long to stay;?And when she left, it seemed somehow?That she was far away.
At last, when we had all forgot?That all is here to change,?A shadow on the commonplace?Was for a moment strange.?Yet there was nothing for surprise,?Nor much that need be told:?Love, with his gift of pain, had given?More than one heart could hold.
The Mill
The miller's wife had waited long,?The tea was cold, the fire was dead;?And there might yet be nothing wrong?In how he went and what he said:?"There are no millers any more,"?Was all that she had heard him say;?And he had lingered at the door?So long that it seemed yesterday.
Sick with a fear that had no form?She knew that she was there at last;?And in the mill there was a warm?And mealy fragrance of the past.?What else there was would only seem?To say again what he had meant;?And what was hanging from a beam?Would not have heeded where she went.
And if she thought it followed her,?She may have reasoned in the dark?That one way of the few there were?Would hide her and would leave no mark:?Black water, smooth above the weir?Like starry velvet in the night,?Though ruffled once, would soon appear?The same as ever to the sight.
The Dark Hills
Dark hills at evening in the west,?Where sunset hovers like a sound?Of golden horns that sang to rest?Old bones of warriors under ground,?Far now from all the bannered ways?Where flash the legions of the sun,?You fade -- as if the last of days?Were fading, and all wars were done.
The Three Taverns
When the brethren heard of us, they came to meet us?as far as Appii Forum, and The Three Taverns.
(Acts 28:15)
Herodion, Apelles, Amplias,?And Andronicus? Is it you I see --?At last? And is it you now that are gazing?As if in doubt of me? Was I not saying?That I should come to Rome? I did say that;?And I said furthermore that I should go?On westward, where the gateway of the world?Lets in the central sea. I did say that,?But I say only, now, that I am Paul --?A prisoner of the Law, and of the Lord?A voice made free. If there be time enough?To live, I may have more to tell you then?Of western matters. I go now to Rome,?Where Caesar waits for me, and I shall wait,?And Caesar knows how long. In Caesarea?There was a legend of Agrippa saying?In a light way to Festus, having heard?My deposition, that I might be free,?Had I stayed free of Caesar; but the word?Of God would have it as you see it is --?And here I am. The cup that I shall drink?Is mine to drink -- the moment or the place?Not mine to say. If it be now in Rome,?Be it now in Rome; and if your faith exceed?The shadow cast of hope, say not of me?Too surely or too soon that years and shipwreck,?And all the many deserts I have crossed?That are not named or regioned, have undone?Beyond the brevities of our mortal healing?The part of me that is the least of me.?You see an older man than he who fell?Prone to the earth when he was nigh Damascus,?Where the great light came down; yet I am he?That fell, and he that saw, and he that heard.?And I am here, at last; and if at last?I give myself to make another crumb?For this pernicious feast of time and men --?Well, I have seen too much of time and men?To fear the ravening or the wrath of either.
Yes, it is Paul you see -- the Saul of Tarsus?That was a fiery Jew, and had men slain?For saying Something was beyond the Law,?And in ourselves. I fed my suffering soul?Upon the Law till I went famishing,?Not knowing that I starved. How should I know,?More then than any, that the food I had --?What else it may have been -- was not for me??My fathers and their fathers and their fathers?Had found it good, and said there was no other,?And I was of the line. When Stephen fell,?Among the stones that crushed his life away,?There was no place alive that I could see?For such a man. Why should a man be given?To live beyond the Law? So I said then,?As men say now to me. How then do I?Persist in living? Is that what you ask??If so, let my appearance be for you?No living answer; for Time writes of death?On men before they die, and what you see?Is not the man. The man that you see not --?The man within the man -- is most alive;?Though hatred would have ended, long ago,?The bane of his activities. I have lived,?Because the faith within me that is life?Endures to live, and shall, till soon or late,?Death, like a friend unseen, shall say to me?My toil is over and my work begun.
How often,