Verse, perhaps Ironic

Mistaken

I never thought that you could mourn
As other women do.
A blossom from your garland torn,
A jewel dropped that you had worn,
What could that be to you?

You never heard the human sound
Of wailing and despair.
Now faithful proved nor faithless found,
You lived and moved in beauty crowned,
Content with being fair.

If I had known those eyes could weep
That used to sparkle so,
You had been mine to love, to keep,
But all too late I probed the deep
And all too late I knew.

Mary Coleridge, 1888.

The Deep-Sea Pearl

The love of my life came not
As love unto others is cast;
For mine was a secret wound -
But the wound grew a pearl, at last.

The divers may come and go,
The tides, they arise and fall;
The pearl in its shell lies sealed,
And the Deep Sea covers all.

Edith Thomas, before 1926

Gone

About the little chambers of my heart
Friends have been coming - going - many a year.
The door stands open there.
Some, lightly stepping, enter; some depart.

Freely they come and freely go, at will.
The walls give back their laughter; all day long
They fill the house with song.
One door is shut, one chamber still.

Mary Coleridge, 1896

2002-11-27, Verses, perhaps ironic

before / after

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