The Dark House
50 lines✦
here a faint light shines alone,Dwells a Demon I have known.Most of you had better say"The Dark House", and go your way.Do not wonder if I stay. For I know the Demon's eyes,And their lure that never dies.Banish all your fond alarms,For I know the foiling charmsOf her eyes and of her arms, And I know that in one roomBurns a lamp as in a tomb;And I see the shadow glide,Back and forth, of one deniedPower to find himself outside. There he is who is my friend,Damned, he fancies, to the end--Vanquished, ever since a doorClosed, he thought, for evermoreOn the life that was before. And the friend who knows him bestSees him as he sees the restWho are striving to be wiseWhile a Demon's arms and eyesHold them as a web would flies. All the words of all the world,Aimed together and then hurled,Would be stiller in his earsThan a closing of still shearsOn a thread made out of years. But there lives another sound,More compelling, more profound;There's a music, so it seems,That assuages and redeems,More than reason, more than dreams. There's a music yet unheardBy the creature of the word,Though it matters little moreThan a wave-wash on a shore--Till a Demon shuts a door. So, if he be very stillWith his Demon, and one will,Murmurs of it may be blownTo my friend who is aloneIn a room that I have known. After that from everywhereSinging life will find him there;Then the door will open wide,And my friend, again outside,Will be living, having died.
✦