<html xmlns:tei="http://www.tei-c.org/ns/1.0"><body><h1 align="" class="head">The Mist</h1><div class="stanza"><p class="line">ALWAYS the rolling mist,</p><p class="line">Wrapping the scene in wet and fleecy fold.</p><p class="line">Moved as a curtain by the sluggish wind,</p><p class="line">Lifting and swaying, falling damp and cold.</p><p class="line">It sweeps, yet passes never, soft and blind.</p><p class="line" style="text-indent:5%">Have sunbeams never kissed</p><p class="line">These dreary hills and life-forsaken slopes—</p><p class="line">Hidden like women's shoulders in a gown</p><p class="line">That mars their beauty? Only shattered hopes</p><p class="line">And ghostly fears people the shadowed down.</p><p class="line">These sunless wreaths are curling round my heart:</p><p class="line">The deadening fingers of the passing years</p><p class="line">Are closing, and I cannot thrust apart</p><p class="line">Their tightening grip. No ray of sun appears.</p><p class="line" style="text-indent:5%">Only the rolling mist.</p></div><p>Huts, France, December, 1916.</p></body></html> · Great War