Under the New Moon
The hills rang back our parting jest;
The dear, dear day was over;
The sun had sunk below the west;
We walk’d home through the clover.
Our words were gay, but thought astray
Our parting kept regretting,—
“The old old way!” would seem to say;
“The suns are ever setting.”
Then, gazing back with longing soon,
At once my step grew bolder;
For, bright and new, I spied the moon
Just over my right shoulder.
I turn’d about and bade her look;
We were not superstitious;
We jok’d about that shining hook,
Bright bait, and skies auspicious.
We joked, but, oh, I thought with woe,
“This bright bait lures me only,—
Like more before it, comes to go,
And leave life dark and lonely.
Past yon horizon, things are strewn
With broken moons,” I told her:
“Each bore a bright hope, too, each moon,
When over my right shoulder.
“Alas to trust in each new light,
A man were moonstruck, surely,—
A lunatic!”—We laugh’d outright,
And then look’d back demurely.
Lo, dimly shown, the moon’s old zone
Made full hope’s crescent new one.
I thought, “Would my old love, made known,
Prove hope of love a true one?—
What would she say?”—I ask’d her soon,
And took her hand to hold her.
“Ah, love,” she sigh’d, “to-night the moon
Is over my right shoulder.”