Neighbors

Edwin Arlington Robinson

As often as we thought of her,
 We thought of a gray life
That made a quaint economist
 Of a wolf-haunted wife;
We made the best of all she bore
 That was not ours to bear,
And honored her for wearing things
 That were not things to wear.

There was a distance in her look
 That made us look again;
And if she smiled, we might believe
 That we had looked in vain.
Rarely she came inside our doors,
 And had not long to stay;
And when she left, it seemed somehow
 That she was far away.

At last, when we had all forgot
 That all is here to change,
A shadow on the commonplace
 Was for a moment strange.
Yet there was nothing for surprise,
 Nor much that need be told:
Love, with his gift of pain, had given
 More than one heart could hold.

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