A Well

XIV.

AWELL

WHAT mystery pervades a well!

      The water lives so far,

Like neighbor from another world

      Residing in a jar.

The grass does not appear afraid;

      I often wonder he

Can stand so close and look so bold

      At what is dread to me.

Related somehow they may be,—

      The sedge stands next the sea,

Where he is floorless, yet of fear

      No evidence gives he.

But nature is a stranger yet;

      The ones that cite her most

Have never passed her haunted house,

      Nor simplified her ghost.

To pity those that know her not

      Is helped by the regret

That those who know her, know her less

      The nearer her they get.