THE WIFE OF LUMLEY MOORE

by: Alice Cary (1820-1871)

AVE you not seen her many a day,
Leaning out of her door,
List'ning and looking far away
The wife of Lumley Moore?
The leaves of the rooftree, thick and dim,
Trembling through and through,
And little birds with necks stretched slim,
As if they listened too?
Have you not seen the air a-hush
And tender with her praise,
And the squirrel hide in his hazel-bush
Ashamed of his clumsy ways?
Her timid glances all alert,
As if her peace was gone,
And her step as light as she feared to hurt
The grass she trod upon?
Have you not heard her piteous sighs
That reached to other years,
And seen the light of her sweet, sweet eyes
Going out in tears?
Poor lady! when at midnight dark
The death-watch beats his drum,
She turns no more in her bed, to hark
For feet that do not come.

The brier its thorny arms all wide
Has thrown across her door,
And the lizard slips where lived and died
The wife of Lumley Mloore.