Astoria by Twilight

ALL pale the daffodil-tinted sky;
The dusky shores that ’neath it lie
Are set like an etching against the color,
As the great steamship plunges by.

There is the road I used to know,
There are the windows still aglow,
As when in those old days of welcome
They lit the visitants to and fro.

There are the gates I used to pass,
The belts of flowers, the shaven grass,
The casements behind which well-known faces
Smiled softly at me through the glass.

No other eye than mine could see
If that dim shape be house or tree;
The true heart hath its inner vision,
It is all clear as day to me.

I see the forms so long unseen,
Stately in age, of reverend mien,
Gay youth, and flower-like baby faces,
And manhood’s aspect grave and keen.

And, beautiful beyond compare,
Mysteriously, strangely fair,
Like some clear star high-hung in heaven
And sweet as summer roses are,—

One dear face hovers o’er the spot,
Which knew her once and knows her not;
And still from out the deathly shadows,
Looks forth, beloved and unforgot.

All vain are beauty, worth, and wit,
The hours come, the hours flit;
Time’s wheel inexorably turneth,
And carries all our hopes with it.

It is life’s common end and way;
Nothing abides and naught may stay;
And strangers in the kinsmen’s places
Front us with alien eyes to-day.

If Grief were not Joy’s earthly stem,
And Time Eternity’s brief hem,
I could not bear it to sit in shadow
And watch that shore—remembering them!