When life is done

When life is done
and friends are gone
then must I sit alone
and dream away
the hours of day
that from the smoky blue
is all I see of you
when I my pipe
do set alight
and yearn for coming Spring
to purge my heart
with flowering love and bring
a tiny part
of happiness my own.

When day is done
and love is gone
with candle up to bed,
then fade my dreams
until it seems
that nothing more is real
of all the things I feel
concerning you,
involving few
save me, my smoky pipe
and love of Spring
that dies when fruit grows ripe;
and looking in
I find my pipe is dead.

When death is done
and fear has gone
with all the rituals read,
then must I sleep,
no more to weep
upon a faceless name
that never will the same
again to me
quite ever be,
and all the worldly foes,
the friends of crime
that no-one ever knows,
will fade in time
and no more will be said.