THE CASUAL ACQUAINTANCE

While he was here in breath and bone,

To speak to and to see,

Would I had known — more clearly known -

What that man did for me

When the wind scraped a minor lay,

And the spent west from white

To gray turned tiredly, and from gray

To broadest bands of night!

But I saw not, and he saw not

What shining life-tides flowed

To me-ward from his casual jot

Of service on that road.

He would have said: “‘ Twas nothing new;

We all do what we can;

‘ Twas only what one man would do

For any other man.”

Now that I gauge his goodliness

He's slipped from human eyes;

And when he passed there's none can guess,

Or point out where he lies.