A PROCESSION OF DEAD DAYS

I see the ghost of a perished day;
I know his face, and the feel of his dawn: 
’Twas he who took me far away
   To a spot strange and gray: 
Look at me, Day, and then pass on,
But come again:  yes, come anon!

Enters another into view;
His features are not cold or white,
But rosy as a vein seen through: 
   Too soon he smiles adieu. 
Adieu, O ghost-day of delight;
But come and grace my dying sight.

Enters the day that brought the kiss: 
He brought it in his foggy hand
To where the mumbling river is,
   And the high clematis;
It lent new colour to the land,
And all the boy within me manned.

Ah, this one.  Yes, I know his name,
He is the day that wrought a shine
Even on a precinct common and tame,
   As ’twere of purposed aim. 
He shows him as a rainbow sign
Of promise made to me and mine.

The next stands forth in his morning clothes,
And yet, despite their misty blue,
They mark no sombre custom-growths
   That joyous living loathes,
But a meteor act, that left in its queue
A train of sparks my lifetime through.

I almost tremble at his nod —
This next in train—­who looks at me
As I were slave, and he were god
   Wielding an iron rod. 
I close my eyes; yet still is he
In front there, looking mastery.

In the similitude of a nurse
The phantom of the next one comes: 
I did not know what better or worse
   Chancings might bless or curse
When his original glossed the thrums
Of ivy, bringing that which numbs.

Yes; trees were turning in their sleep
Upon their windy pillows of gray
When he stole in.  Silent his creep
   On the grassed eastern steep . . . 
I shall not soon forget that day,
And what his third hour took away!

HE FOLLOWS HIMSELF

In a heavy time I dogged myself
   Along a louring way,
Till my leading self to my following self
   Said:  “Why do you hang on me
      So harassingly?”

“I have watched you, Heart of mine,” I cried,
   “So often going astray
And leaving me, that I have pursued,
   Feeling such truancy
      Ought not to be.”

He said no more, and I dogged him on
   From noon to the dun of day
By prowling paths, until anew
   He begged:  “Please turn and flee! —
      What do you see?”

“Methinks I see a man,” said I,
   “Dimming his hours to gray. 
I will not leave him while I know
   Part of myself is he
      Who dreams such dree!”

“I go to my old friend’s house,” he urged,
   “So do not watch me, pray!”
“Well, I will leave you in peace,” said I,
   “Though of this poignancy
      You should fight free: