Shapes and Shadows — The Old House

THE OLD HOUSE.

Quaint and forgotten, by an unused road, An old house stands: around its doors the dense Blue iron-weeds grow high;

The chipmunks make a highway of its fence;

And on its sunken flagstones slug and toad Silent as lichens lie.

The timid snake upon its hearth's cool sand Sleeps undisturbed; the squirrel haunts its roof;

And in the clapboard sides Of closets, dim with many a spider woof, Like the uncertain tapping of a hand, The beetle-borer hides.

Above its lintel, under mossy eaves, The mud-wasps build their cells; and in the floor Of its neglected porch The black bees nest.

Through each deserted door, Vague as a phantom's footsteps, steal the leaves, And dropped cones of the larch.

But come with me when sunset's magic old Transforms the ruin of that ancient house;

When windows, one by one,-- Like age's eyes, that youth's love-dreams arouse,-- Grow lairs of fire; and glad mouths of gold Its wide doors, in the sun.

Or let us wait until each rain-stained room Is carpeted with moonlight, pattened oft With the deep boughs o'erhead;

And through the house the wind goes rustling soft, As might the ghost--a whisper of perfume-- Of some sweet girl long dead.