High Falcon & Other Poems/Early Waking

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EARLY WAKING
Four hooves rang out and now are still.In the dark wall the casements holdEssential day above each sill,Just light, and colored like thin gold.Behind those hooves a drowsy courseAll night I rode where hearts were clear,And wishes blessèd at the source,And for no shape of time stop here.
No more to raise that lively ghostWhich ran quicksilver to the bone:By a whim's turn the whole was lostWhen all its marrow worth was known.Ghosts can cast shadows in the breast,And what was present tears to weep,Not heart nor mind would bid from restAs fast as sorrow's, ten years deep.
I travel, not for a ghost's sake,One step from sleep, and not for oneLeft sleeping at my side I wake.Before bricks rosy with the dawn,The hooves will sound beyond the light:There are dark roads enough to goTo last us through the end of night,And I will make my waking slow.
It was for unconcerning lightThat has not fallen on earth, to stare ​An instant only out of nightAnd with night's cloudy character,Before the laden mind shall slipPast dream and on to bright most dreamAnd fetterless high morning dipHer two cold sandals in the stream.
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