Something a twittering cry is uttering.
Is that a bird there on her breast,
Lost in the fragrant gloom,
Wakening to morning twilight in the tomb?
No bird--it is her folded hands a-fluttering!
I think I should have died to see her rise
Among the withered wreaths
And spider-cluttered palls
Of her dead uncles' funerals,
While streams of horror fed the blue lakes of her eyes.
I known I would have died to see her rise.
_Over the fields a voice calls from the tomb,_
_Pleading and pleading drearily,_
_But all the slaves have fled_
_And left her talking to her coffined dead,_
_And whimpering eerily._
_The young birds die_
_To see old hands thrust from the window-slit,_
_Clutching the light in handfuls of despair;_
_Stark fear has stroked the color from her hair,_
_While from the window comes_
_The babbled whisper of her prayer._
_Night is like spiders in her mouth;_
_By day they spin a film across her eyes._
_Now night; now day--_
_The birds come back;_
_It is another year:_
_The withering voice they fear_
_Has nothing more to say.
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