Page:Collected poems vol 1 de la mare.djvu/158

 S there anybody there?" said the Traveller,
 * Knocking on the moonlit door;

And his horse in the silence champed the grasses
 * Of the forest's ferny floor:

And a bird flew up out of the turret,
 * Above the Traveller's head:

And he smote upon the door again a second time;
 * "Is there anybody there? " he said.

But no one descended to the Traveller;
 * No head from the leaf-fringed sill

Leaned over and looked into his grey eyes,
 * Where he stood perplexed and still.

But only a host of phantom listeners
 * That dwelt in the lone house then

Stood listening in the quiet of the moonlight
 * To that voice from the world of men:

Stood thronging the faint moonbeams on the dark stair,
 * That goes down to the empty hall,

Hearkening in an air stirred and shaken
 * By the lonely Traveller's call.

And he felt in his heart their strangeness,
 * Their stillness answering his cry,