THE RED RIBBON DREAM

As I stood by the stair-head in the upper hail

The rooms to left and right were locked as before.

It was senseless to hammer at an unreal door

Painted on the plaster of a ten-foot wall.

There was half-light here, piled darkness beyond

Rising up sheer as the mountain of Time,

The blank rock-face that no thought can climb,

Girdled around with the Slough of Despond.

I stood quite dumb, sunk fast in the mire,

Lonely as the first man, or the last man,

Chilled to despair since evening began,

Dazed for the memory of a lost desire.

But a voice said ‘Easily’, and a voice said ‘Come!’

Easily I followed with no thought of doubt,

Turned to the right hand, and the way stretched out;

The ground held firmly; I was no more dumb.

For that was the place where I longed to be,

And past all hope there the kind lamp shone,

The carpet was holy that my feet were on,

And logs on the fire lay hissing for me.

The cushions were friendship and the chairs were love,

Shaggy with love was the great wolf skin,

The clock ticked ‘Easily’ as I entered in,

‘Come,’ called the bullfinch from his cage above.

Love went before me; it was shining now

From the eyes of a girl by the window wall,

Whose beauty I knew to be fate and all

By the thin red ribbon on her calm brow.

[From Whipperginny (1923)]