Fannie Stearns Davis

OLD house, old room, what do you think of me,

And all my little windy smiles and tears—

My easy woe and easier ecstasy:

Old house, old room, who know the falling years?

I wonder if my loneliness is strange

To you, tall windows, free with night and day.

Who else has loved the seasons’ lingering change

Across the courts and roofs? What eyes more gay

Have glanced through you, nor watched the moon too well

Because they sought some face less cold and far?

What feet upon your wornout thresholds fell,

More light, more daring, than my dull feet are?

Or, oh, what passionate sorrow may have swept

From wall to wall, and shaken them like cloth?

What weary wounded arrogance has kept

A blundering watch here, like a wing-scorched moth?

Has Death lain here, maybe, all night, all night,

Where I in ruddy restlessness do lie:

The folded hands, the lips so smiling white?

O room, what wind of Fate has lashed you high

Upon the wave of tragedy and tears?

And I sit here, and write such foolish things!

Old house, old room, who know the falling years,

How faint must be my gloom and gloryings!