The Ballad of the Quick and Dead
And every night I sit alone,
And every night I see
A little cotton-aproned ghost
Who takes no heed of me.
She sets the milk, she sets the bread,
One scarce would know that she was dead—
But long ago death gave her greeting,
In the great bed whence one can see
The sunset in the cherry tree,
And hear the fold-bound wethers bleating.
In a far country lives the man
Who loved this little maid,
He knows not, cares not, that each night
His supper here is laid.
She lays it as in twilights gone,
When, all the farmstead labour done,
His passion in her arms would take
Its daylong waited recompense—
And her lost peace and innocence
She gave ungrudging for his sake.
She lived for love, she died for love,
Though love was agony,
And here, where joy was sold for love,
She loves eternally.
He does not care—he wanders far,
Where light and wine and pleasure are;
He strives and battles to forget
The little cottage dove he caught,
Who gave so much and asked for naught,
And haunts the crumbling farmhouse yet.
O Lord, how happy I should be,
If one my heart holds dear
Would come and spread the board for me,
As she who rambles here!
I should not wander far away,
Or struggle to forget the day
I loved, but to her straight would speed,
And pledge the cup and break the bread
With one who has been ten years dead—
Ah, that were heaven indeed!
It may not be—no dreams of me
Disturb her quiet sleep;
She little knows that dreams of her
Wake me each night to weep.
I never mocked her confidence,
Or robbed her of her innocence,
But with both hands I gave her all
I had to give—she did not see
My love, she never thinks of me,
She comes not when I call.
So every night I sit alone,
And every night I see
A little cotton-aproned ghost
Who takes no heed of me.
This is the tragedy of love,
By all men be it read,
’Tis thus the dead dream of the quick,
The quick dream of the dead.
This is the mockery of love,
By all men be it read,
’Tis thus the dead forget the quick,
The quick forget the dead.