UPON A DYING LADY
 
 I
 Her Courtesy
 
 WITH the old kindness, the old distinguished grace,
 She lies, her lovely piteous head amid dull red hair
 propped upon pillows, rouge on the pallor of her face.
 She would not have us sad because she is lying there,
 And when she meets our gaze her eyes are laughter-lit,
 Her speech a wicked tale that we may vie with her,
 Matching our broken-hearted wit against her wit,
 Thinking of saints and of petronius Arbiter.
 
 II
 Curtain Artist bring her Dolls and Drawings
 Bring where our Beauty lies
 A new modelled doll, or drawing,
 With a friend's or an enemy's
 Features, or maybe showing
 Her features when a tress
 Of dull red hair was flowing
 Over some silken dress
 Cut in the Turkish fashion,
 Or, it may be, like a boy's.
 We have given the world our passion,
 We have naught for death but toys.
 
 III
 She turns the Dolls' Faces to the Wall
 Because to-day is some religious festival
 They had a priest say Mass, and even the Japanese,
 Heel up and weight on toe, must face the wall
 – Pedant in passion, learned in old courtesies,
 Vehement and witty she had seemed – ; the Venetian lady
 Who had seemed to glide to some intrigue in her red shoes,
 Her domino, her panniered skirt copied from Longhi;
 The meditative critic; all are on their toes,
 Even our Beauty with her Turkish trousers on.
 Because the priest must have like every dog his day
 Or keep us all awake with baying at the moon,
 We and our dolls being but the world were best away.
 
 IV
 The End of Day
 She is playing like a child
 And penance is the play,
 Fantastical and wild
 Because the end of day
 Shows her that some one soon
 Will come from the house, and say –
 Though play is but half done –
 "Come in and leave the play.'
 
 V
 Her Race
 She has not grown uncivil
 As narrow natures would
 And called the pleasures evil
 Happier days thought good;
 She knows herself a woman,
 No red and white of a face,
 Or rank, raised from a common
 Vnreckonable race;
 And how should her heart fail her
 Or sickness break her will
 With her dead brother's valour
 For an example still?
 
 VI
 Her Courage
 When her soul flies to the predestined dancing-place
 (I have no speech but symbol, the pagan speech I made
 Amid the dreams of youth) let her come face to face,
 Amid that first astonishment, with Grania's shade,
 All but the terrors of the woodland flight forgot
 That made her Diatmuid dear, and some old cardinal
 Pacing with half-closed eyelids in a sunny spot
 Who had murmured of Giorgione at his latest breath –
 Aye, and Achilles, Timor, Babar, Barhaim, all
 Who have lived in joy and laughed into the face of Death.
 
 VII
 Her Friends bring her a Christmas Tree
 pardon, great enemy,
 Without an angry thought
 We've carried in our tree,
 And here and there have bought
 Till all the boughs are gay,
 And she may look from the bed
 On pretty things that may
 please a fantastic head.
 Give her a little grace,
 What if a laughing eye
 Have looked into your face?
 It is about to die.