The Maiden

 Carve for me
A lost memory
Vaguely held from years misplaced:
Tragedies the infant soul embraced
When sang were the tears of blue
And the sky that fell within my view.

I ponder yet the maiden fair—
O! The sweet plague of her core!
Rekindle I pray her lone despair
That you sang of once before—

But instead speak my name
I have grown into the rain
And the illness I since became
Hears her heart break again.

Perhaps your ears itch to tell
The boy who left in the spring
That the notes of his farewell
Are all you know how to sing.

Mother I feel the roses know
The gleam of the distant echo
With every falling tear
Carves the lines I wish to hear

So by worm and stillness bound
The feast stirs with crippled sound:
The single line I ever knew
Kisses the pall the shadows threw

Kiss the shadow that stole me
With the olden melody
Bring me home cradled to and fro
Kiss the shadow…
Where the maiden and I had to go.