In the window’s shade ere the dusk has spread
Over plain and hill,
And the tulip-flowers in the garden-bed
Have a glory still;
When the world of toil and the world of ease
Are alike at rest;
I can hear him play in the belt of trees
Where the fields slope west.
And the notes run high and the notes run low
In a rambling stream;
Like an old voice calling from long ago,
A dream of a dream.
His eyes are afire with the secret light
Of a land unknown,
And the tree-stems echo his footsteps’ flight
Upon moss and stone.
There is no more staying nor rest for me
When his flute is heard,
It is out, out, out to the melody
Without sign or word.
The lamps may be lit in the shuttered room
And the door be fast,
Or a long day faint with a summer’s bloom
On the hedges cast;
Let the path be winding in crowded ways
Or in woods profound,
It is all forgotten when once he plays
And I hear the sound.
Though foot may ache and though heart may fail
And the brain grow numb,
It is follow, follow the flying trail
Till the flute is dumb.
For life was a breath of the early spring,
When at first he came,
And, now that the harvest is ripening,
It is still the same;
And it well may be when the last dusk falls
On my little day,
When the last sun colours the crumbling walls
Of the house of clay;
I shall hear him playing beyond the hill
Where the fields slope west,
And follow him on till his steps are still
And the flute at rest.
❦