The Keys of Morning

The Keys of Morning written by Walter de la Mare

The Listeners and Other Poems (1912)

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 While at her bedroom window once,
 Learning her task for school,
 Little Louisa lonely sat
 In the morning clear and cool,
 She slanted her small bead-brown eyes
 Across the empty street,
 And saw Death softly watching her
 In the sunshine pale and sweet.

 His was a long lean sallow face;
 He sat with half-shut eyes,
 Like an old sailor in a ship
 Becalmed 'neath tropic skies.
 Beside him in the dust he had set
 His staff and shady hat;
 These, peeping small, Louisa saw
 Quite clearly where she sat -
 The thinness of his coal-black locks,
 His hands so long and lean
 They scarcely seemed to grasp at all
 The keys that hung between:
 Both were of gold, but one was small,
 And with this last did he
 Wag in the air, as if to say,
 "Come hither, child, to me!"

 Louisa laid her lesson book
 On the cold window-sill;
 And in the sleepy sunshine house
 Went softly down, until
 She stood in the half-opened door,
 And peeped. But strange to say
 Where Death just now had sunning sat
 Only a shadow lay:
 Just the tall chimney's round-topped cowl,
 And the small sun behind,
 Had with its shadow in the dust
 Called sleepy Death to mind.
 But most she thought how strange it was
 Two keys that he should bear,
 And that, when beckoning, he should wag
 The littlest in the air.

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