Revenant

In the dark hours I woke and heard the trees

That tossed and buffeted before the blast,

Straining and sighing while the gale went past;

And, as a scourge whose wrath might none appease,

The raindrops smote the pane and ran in seas,

Gurgling against the frame; now thick and fast,

And now like pebbles at the window cast

By some lost spirit that could find no ease.

And from the blackness of the dripping night

I turned me, weary of its sodden gloom,

Smiling to see the glow within the room

And the red embers on the hearth alight;

Then sudden ceased, and bowed my head again,

Thinking of that one gravestone in the rain.