Who'd read it, or who'd understand?"
But the little bare feet on the stairway,
And the faint, smothered laugh in the hall,
And the eerie-low lisp on the silence,
Cry up to me over it all.


_The Sphinx_

I know all about the Sphinx--
I know even what she thinks,
Staring with her stony eyes
Up forever at the skies.

For last night I dreamed that she
Told me all the mystery--
Why for aeons mute she sat--:
She was just cut out for that!


_If I knew What Poets Know_

If I knew what poets know,
Would I write a rhyme
Of the buds that never blow
In the summer-time ?
Would I sing of golden seeds
Springing up in ironweeds?
And of raindrops turned to snow,
If I knew what poets know?