Classic Poem

There is a faltering crimson by the wall,
Now on a vine, and now on briar thinned,
As though one bearing lantern through the wind,
Here hides his light, but yonder lets it fall.
And we remember and remember; all
Ancestral stirrings point unto this fate,—
That we shall come unto our old estate,
Defrauding days unloose their iron thrall.
Without, the trees seem crowding to the street,
Like simple folk that breathless here and there
Crowd toward a haunted space, to verify
Some dim report of ghost or vision fleet;
And lo, at dusk, across the silent square,
As in a whirl of bloom, a Shape goes by!