THE SECRET WAY

by: Zona Gale (1874-1938)

TARK on the window's early grey

Lined out in squares by casement bars,

She saw her lily lift to take

The sinking stars.

 

Within the room's delaying dark

Intimate things lay dim and still

With all their day-time friendliness

Gone false and chill.

 

Her hand upon the coverlet,

Her face low in the linen's cleft,

They were as wan as water-flowers

By light bereft.

 

And never was bloom brought to her couch

But shed the odour of a sigh

Because she was as white as they,

And they must die.

 

"O Pale, lit deep within the dark

Of your young eyes, a stifled light

Leaps thin and keen as melody

And leavens night.

 

"It is a light that did not burn

When you were gay at mart and fair;

O Pale, what is that starry fire,

Fed unaware?"

 

Then softly she: "I may not tell

What other eyes behold in mine;

But I have melted night and day

In some wild wine.

 

"I may not read the graven cup

Exhaustless as a brimming bell

Distilling silver; but I drank

And all is well.

 

"One morn like this, bitter still,

I waited for the early stir

Of those who slept the while I watched

What muffled wonders were.

 

"I saw my lily on the sill;

I saw my mirror on the wall

Take light that was not; and I saw

My spectral taper tall.

 

"Why I had known these quiet things

Since I could speak. Yet suddenly

They all touched hands and in one breath

They spoke to me.

 

"I may not tell you what they said.

The strange part is that I must lie

And never tell you what we say--

These things and I.

 

"I only know that common things

Bear sudden little spirits set

Free by the rose of dawn and by

Night's violet.

 

"I only know that when I hear

Clear tone, the haunted echoes bear

Legions of little winged feet

On printless air.

 

"And when warm colour weds my look

A word is uttered tremblingly,

With meaning fall--but I know not

What it may be.

 

"I only know that now I find

Abiding beauty everywhere;

Or if it bide not, that it fades

Is still more fair.

 

I long to question those I love

And yet I know not what to say;

I am alone as one upon

Some secret way.

 

"My words are barren of my bliss;

The strange part is that I must lie

And never tell you what we say--

These things and I.

 

"So will it be when I am not.

A little more perhaps to tell;

Yet then as now I may not say

What I know well."

 

She died when all the east was red.

And we are they who know her fate

Because we love the way of life

That she had found too late.

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