Poem by Edwin Arlington Robinson

Neighbors

AS often as we thought of her,
    We thought of a gray life 
That made a quaint economist
    Of a wolf-haunted wife; 
We made the best of all she bore
    That was not ours to bear, 
And honored her for wearing things
    That were not things to wear.

There was a distance in her look
    That made us look again; 
And if she smiled, we might believe
    That we had looked in vain. 
Rarely she came inside our doors,
    And had not long to stay; 
And when she left, it seemed somehow
    That she was far away.

At last, when we had all forgot
    That all is here to change, 
A shadow on the commonplace
    Was for a moment strange. 
Yet there was nothing for suprise,
    Nor much that need be told: 
Love, with its gift of pain, had given
    More than one heart could hold.

1. The Clinging Vine
2. Old King Cole
3. London Bridge
4. Llewellyn and the Tree
5. The Valley of the Shadow

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