From candle-douting to candle-teening 
I labour at the weary gleaning: 
The scattered ears I gather up, 
Eat of your bread, drink of your cup; 
And yet no ray of light can guide you 
To guess a Pixy works beside you — 
You of your wisdom overweening. 

I only of my wayward clan
Accept the food and wage of man: 
I labour in your fields all day,
Whence my own folk have fled away. 
No voices call me to the moor 
When at the noon the heat grows sore — 
I bear my burden as I can. 

My fairy birthright I have lost; 
And yet I never grudge the cost, 
Because of one who gleans beside me, 
Whose cloud of russet hair shall hide me 
From Sorrow, who goes seeking ever 
For hearts to break and lives to sever. 
The running brooks for her I crossed: 

Thresholds of human homes I passed, 
My lot among you mortals cast, 
Because a gleaner's eyes were kind, 
A gleaner's voice rang down the wind 
Like a bird's music, lost in leaves. 
I'll bind a whole green shire of sheaves 
If she will love me at the last.

O tell me, friends, while yet we part,
And heart can yet be heard of heart,
O tell me then, for what is it
Our early plan of life we quit;
From all our old intentions range,
And why does all so wholly change?
O tell me, friends, while yet we part!

O tell me, friends, while yet we part,—
The rays that from the centre start
Within the orb of one warm sun,
Unless I err, have once begun,—
Why is it thus they still diverge?
And whither tends the course they urge?
O tell me, friends, while yet we part!

O tell me, friends, while yet ye hear,—
May it not be, some coming year,
These ancient paths that here divide
Shall yet again run side by side,
And you from there, and I from here,
All on a sudden reappear?
O tell me, friends, while yet ye hear!

O tell me, friends, ye hardly hear,—
And if indeed ye did, I fear
Ye would not say, ye would not speak,—
Are you so strong, am I so weak,
And yet, how much so e’er I yearn,
Can I not follow, nor you turn?
O tell me, friends, ye hardly hear!

O tell me, friends, ere words are o’er!
There’s something in me sad and sore
Repines, and underneath my eyes
I feel a somewhat that would rise,—
O tell me, O my friends, and you,
Do you feel nothing like it too?
O tell me, friends, ere words are o’er!

O tell me, friends that are no more,
Do you, too, think ere it is o’er
Old times shall yet come round as erst,
And we be friends, as we were first?
Or do you judge that all is vain,
Except that rule that none complain?
O tell me, friends that are no more!