Chapter LXII

Down through the dark, indignant trees,
On indistinguishable wings
Of storm, the wind of evening swings;
Before its insane anger flees
Distracted leaf and the shattered bough:
There is a rushing, as when seas
Of thunder beat an iron prow
On reefs of wrath and roaring wreck:
’Mid stormy leaves, a hurrying speck
Of flickering blackness, driven by,
A mad bat whirls along the sky.

Like some sad shadow, in the eve’s
Deep melancholy--visible
As by some strange and twilight spell--
A gaunt girl stands among the leaves,
The night-wind in her dolorous dress:
Symbolic of the life that grieves,
Of toil that patience makes not less,
Her load of faggots fallen there.--
A wilder shadow sweeps the air,
And she is gone: Was it the dumb
Eidolon of the month to come?