TWO LOOK AT TWO
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ove and forgetting might have carried themA little further up the mountain sideWith night so near, but not much further up.They must have halted soon in any caseWith thoughts of the path back, how rough it wasWith rock and washout, and unsafe in darkness;When they were halted by a tumbled wallWith barbed-wire binding. They stood facing this,Spending what onward impulse they still hadIn one last look the way they must not go,On up the failing path, where, if a stoneOr earthslide moved at night, it moved itself;No footstep moved it. "This is all," they sighed,"Good-night to woods." But not so; there was more.A doe from round a spruce stood looking at themAcross the wall, as near the wall as they.She saw them in their field, they her in hers.The difficulty of seeing what stood still,Like some up-ended boulder split in two,Was in her clouded eyes: they saw no fear there.She seemed to think that two thus they were safe.Then, as if they were something that, though strange,She could not trouble her mind with too long,She sighed and passed unscared along the wall."_This_, then, is all. What more is there to ask?"But no, not yet. A snort to bid them wait.A buck from round the spruce stood looking at themAcross the wall as near the wall as they.This was an antlered buck of lusty nostril,Not the same doe come back into her place.He viewed them quizzically with jerks of head,As if to ask, "Why don't you make some motion?Or give some sign of life? Because you can't.I doubt if you're as living as you look."Thus till he had them almost feeling daredTo stretch a proffering hand--and a spell-breaking.Then he too passed unscared along the wall.Two had seen two, whichever side you spoke from."This _must_ be all." It was all. Still they stood,A great wave from it going over them,As if the earth in one unlooked-for favorHad made them certain earth returned their love.
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