The Front Door

and guard&mdash;such ones as say
 * In matter lives no spirit, lie;

The household through me throbs and beats, The meaning of the crowded streets
 * Is plain, and once a year I may

Admit the beings of the sky.

Lost souls revisiting the earth
 * To see old loves that they be well,

And find their hold upon the heart, In life so strong, in death depart;
 * Wherefore with peals of soundless mirth

Goes each one to his place in hell.

The curtain on a winter's night
 * Struggles and beats as if it fought

In every fold a power of air; The unseen fills each vacant chair;
 * The living lavish not a thought

On those that are not in their sight.

Life and dark death go hand in hand,&mdash;
 * Believe or disbelieve my tale,&mdash;

How Death is Life, how Life is Death, How that the spirit wandereth,
 * How bolts and bars may not prevail

To guard us from the Other Land.