The Dark House
Where a faint light shines alone,Dwells a Demon I have known.Most of you had better say“The Dark House”, and go your way.Do not wonder if I stay.
For I know the Demon’s eyes,And their lure that never dies.Banish all your fond alarms,For I know the foiling charmsOf her eyes and of her arms,
And I know that in one roomBurns a lamp as in a tomb;And I see the shadow glide,Back and forth, of one deniedPower to find himself outside.
There he is who is my friend,Damned, he fancies, to the end—Vanquished, ever since a doorClosed, he thought, for evermoreOn the life that was before.
And the friend who knows him bestSees him as he sees the restWho are striving to be wiseWhile a Demon’s arms and eyesHold them as a web would flies.
All the words of all the world,Aimed together and then hurled,Would be stiller in his earsThan a closing of still shearsOn a thread made out of years.
But there lives another sound,More compelling, more profound;There’s a music, so it seems,That assuages and redeems,More than reason, more than dreams.
There’s a music yet unheardBy the creature of the word,Though it matters little moreThan a wave-wash on a shore—Till a Demon shuts a door.
So, if he be very stillWith his Demon, and one will,Murmurs of it may be blownTo my friend who is aloneIn a room that I have known.
After that from everywhereSinging life will find him there;Then the door will open wide,And my friend, again outside,Will be living, having died.