Shadowed Souls

She died indeed, but to him her breath
Was more than a light blown out by death:
He knew that they breathed the self-same air,
That not midst the dead was her pale face fair
But that she waited for him somewhere.

To some dead city, or ancient town,
Where the mouldering towers were crumbling down,
Or in some old mansion habited
By dust and silence and things long dead,
He knew the Shadows of Souls were led.

For years he wandered a weary way,
His eyes shone sadder, his hair grew grey
But still he knew that she lived for whom
No grave lay waiting, no white carv'd tomb,
No earthly silence, no voiceless gloom.

But once in a bitter year he came
To an old dying town with a long dead name:
That eve, as he walked thro' the dusty ways
And the echoes woke in the empty place,

He came on a Shadow face to face.

It looked, but uttered no word at all
Then beckoned him into an old dim hall:
And lo, as soon as he passed between
The pillars with age and damp mould green
His eyes were dazed by a strange wild scene.

A thousand lamps fill'd the place with light,
And fountains glimmered faerily bright
But never a single sound was heard,
The dreadful silence was never stirred,
Not even the breath of a single word

Came from the shadowy multitude,
More dense than leaves in a summer wood,
Than the sands where the swift tides ebb and flow;
But ever the Shades moved to and fro
As windless waves on the sea will go.

Then he who had come to the Shadow-land
Swift strode by many a group and band;
But never a glimpse he caught of her,
In fleeting shadow or loiterer,
For whom the earth held no sepulchre.

He knew that she was not dead whom he
So loved with bitterest memory,
To whom through anguish'd years he had prayed;
Yet came she never, no sign was made,
No touch on his haggard frame was laid.

At last to an empty room he came
And there he saw in letters of flame
“This is a palace no king controls,
A place unwritten in human scrolls,—
This is the Haunt of Shadowed Souls:

“If thy Shadow-soul be here no more,
Seek thine old life's deserted shore:
And there, mayhap, thou wilt find again,
Recovered now through sorrow and pain;
The Soul thou didst thy most to have slain.”
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