Or work, and often unawares I caught
Odd little whispered phrases on his lips
As if he talked to himself, in a kind of dream.
Yet I believe the clouds dispersed a little
Around his death-bed, and with that strange joy
Which comes in death, he saw the unchanging stars.
Christine was there. She held him in her arms.
I think, too, that he knew his work was safe.
An hour before he died, he smiled at me,
And whispered,--what he meant I hardly know--
Perhaps a broken echo from the past,
A fragment of some old familiar thought,
And yet I seemed to know. It haunts me still:
_'Come then, swift-footed, let me see you stand,
Waiting before me, crowned with youth and joy;
This is the turning. Take it from my hand.
For I am ready, ready now, to fall.'"_




III

KEPLER


John Kepler, from the chimney corner, watched
His wife Susannah, with her sleeves rolled back
Making a salad in a big blue bowl.
The thick tufts of his black rebellious hair