The dance was over. There was one last fiddle
Playing a crazy jig, but no one listened.
In couples his young friends walked through the meadow,
And down the lane. He watched their bobbing lanterns
That disappeared into the woods, and thought,
“She will be coming soon, she will be coming.”
His mare stamped restlesly. In the dull wood-lot,
Two ghostly owls were mating. Bullírogs groaned
Across the marshes; and ïín some fence corner,
Over thetir liquor, farmers were carousing.
But in his ears the shouting and the laughter,
The marsh frogs and the owls formed a wild music,
A chorus that his blood throbbed and repeated:
“She will be coming soon—she will be coming.”
Why was he waitng? When the month was over,
He would be in the city, and meet people
Finer than these—girls twenty times as lovely.
There he would fnd the adventures he was seeking.
He would have money, and would hear no longer
“The drunken lumber-jacks and backwoods farmers
Stupid with beer, and shouting.
Ií he married,
And farmed, as had his father and his brothers,
Lifelong he would be following the round
Of plowing soggy ground to sow with corn,
Of cultivating, harvesting and husking.
He could not marry her. But stil that chorus
Of silly words rang in hís ears, insistent:
“She will be coming soon, she will be coming.”
Out of the shadow she slipped into moonlight,
And stood beside him staring with round eyes
Expectanty……
“Why Harry, you’re not angry?
What makes you ….. you’re so quiet—”
Desperately
He bent and kissed her.
“Their two shadows lengthened
Across the hayfield, where the dew had turned
“The stubble into silver. And the frogs,
And lonely owls that screeched across the woodlot,
“The drunken laughter, and the loncly fiddle,
Out of discordance, turned to symphony,
“Turned to an intoxicated chorus:
“She came to meet me here, she came to mmeet me.”
Leave a Reply