I talk with you of foolish things and wise,
    Of persons, places, books, desires and aims, 
Yet all our words a silence underlies,
    An earnest, vivid thought that neither names.

Ah! what to us where foolish talk or wise?
    Were persons, places, books, desires or aims, 
Without the deeper sense that underlies, 
    The sweet encircling thought that neither names? 

¹⁸⁸²

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
‘My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!’
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”

In Ipswich nights are cool and fair,
   And the voice that comes from the yonder sea
Sings to the quaint old mansions there
   Of “the time, the time that used to be”;
And the quaint old mansions rock and groan,
And they seem to say in an undertone,
With half a sight and with half a moan:
   “It was, but it never again will be.”

In Ipswich witches weave at night
   Their magic spells with impish glee;
They shriek and laugh in their demon flight
   From the old Main House to the frightened sea.
And ghosts of eld come out to weep
Over the town that is fast asleep;
And they sob and they wail, as on they creep:
   “It was, but it never again will be.”

In Ipswich riseth Heart-Break Hill
   Over against the calling sea;
And through the nights so deep and chill
   Watcheth a maiden constantly,—
Watcheth alone, nor seems to hear
Over the roar of the waves anear
The pitiful cry of a far-off year:
   “It was, but it never again will be.”

In Ipswich once a witch I knew,—
   An artless Saxon witch was she;
By that flaxen hair and those eyes of blue,
   Sweet was the spell she cast on me.
Alas! but the years have wrought me ill,
And the heart that is old and battered and chill
Seeketh again on Heart-Break Hill
   What was, but never again can be.

Dear Anna, I would not conjure down
   The ghost that cometh to solace me;
I love to think of old Ipswich town,
   Where somewhat better than friends were we;
For with every thought of the dear old place
Cometh again the tender grace
Of a Saxon witch’s pretty face,
   As it was, and is, and ever shall be.