Eight Harvard Poets/Across the Taut Strings

ACROSS the taut string of my yearning soul
Pass fingers of all fleet and beautiful things:
Comings of dawn and moonlight glimmerings,
Mid-summer hush and Sabbath bells that toll
Over broad fields, a sound of thrushes' wings
Near sunset hour, a girl with lips apart,
Wonder and laughter, — these have touched my heart
And left their music lingering on its strings.

At twilight of some gray, eventual year,
A few late friends will turn, with trembling breath,
From the raw mound of earth that hides my face. …
Yet I shall still find beauty, even in death,
And some lone traveller of the night will hear
An echo of music in that quiet place.