Shut Out

The door was shut. I looked between
 Its iron bars; and saw it lie,
 My garden, mine, beneath the sky,
Pied with all flowers bedewed and green:

From bough to bough the song-birds crossed,
 From flower to flower the moths and bees;
 With all its nests and stately trees
It had been mine, and it was lost.

A shadowless spirit kept the gate,
 Blank and unchanging like the grave.
 I peering through said: 'Let me have
Some buds to cheer my outcast state.'

He answered not. 'Or give me, then,
 But one small twig from shrub or tree;
 And bid my home remember me
Until I come to it again.'

The spirit was silent; but he took
 Mortar and stone to build a wall;
 He left no loophole great or small
Through which my straining eyes might look:

So now I sit here quite alone
 Blinded with tears; nor grieve for that,
 For nought is left worth looking at
Since my delightful land is gone.

A violet bed is budding near,
 Wherein a lark has made her nest:
 And good they are, but not the best;
And dear they are, but not so dear.