Classic Poem

Turning the secrets from her pack of cards,
Warning of sickness, tracing out a theft,
Guarding from danger as an omen guards,
Her hand grew withered as it grew more deft . . .

Till in the stuffy parlor where she lies,
Now to these clients, neighbors, debtors, friends,
Truest is proven of her prophecies,
" I shall be dead before December ends. "

That old man, facing us, who many years
Carried the marvellous message of her art,
Now hear him how he tells us with his tears
The simpler larger wisdom of her heart.

For she was quick to share the good that came,
So that young mothers turned at last and slept
And loafers gruffly reverenced her name —
Yet more than all she gave away she kept,

Kept red geraniums on her window-sill
And a gay garden in that narrow plot
Fenced-in behind her house. You'll find there still
Her hoe, her rake, her rusty watering-pot.

Bright, in the midst of all these dingy yards,
Her roses, hollyhocks and pansies grew;
As if some happy jester in the cards
Whispered the gayest secret that he knew.