The Child at the Gate

The sunset was a sleepy gold,
And stars were in the skies
When down a weedy lane he strolled
In vague and thoughtless wise.

And then he saw it, near a wood,
An old house, gabled brown,
Like some old woman, in a hood,
Looking toward the town.

A child stood at its broken gate,
Singing a childish song,
And weeping softly as if Fate
Had done her child's heart wrong.

He spoke to her:--"Now tell me, dear,
Why do you sing and weep?"--
But she--she did not seem to hear,
But stared as if asleep.

Then suddenly she turned and fled
As if with soul of fear.
He followed; but the house looked dead,
And empty many a year.

The light was wan: the dying day
Grew ghostly suddenly:
And from the house he turned away,
Wrapped in its mystery.

They told him no one dwelt there now:
It was a haunted place.--
And then it came to him, somehow,
The memory of a face.

That child's--like hers, whose name was Joy--
For whom his heart was fain:
The face of her whom, when a boy,
He played with in that lane.