The Sunshade

Ah—it's the skeleton of a lady's sunshade	
    Here at my feet in the hard rock's chink	
    Merely a naked sheaf of wires!—
    Twenty years have gone with their livers and diers	
    Since it was silked in its white or pink	

Noonshine riddles the ribs of the sunshade	
    No more a screen from the weakest ray	
    Nothing to tell us the hue of its dyes	
    Nothing but rusty bones as it lies	
    In its coffin of stone unseen till to day.	

Where is the woman who carried that sun shade	
    Up and down this seaside place?—
    Little thumb standing against its stem	
    Thoughts perhaps bent on a love stratagem	
    Softening yet more the already soft face!	

Is the fair woman who carried that sunshade	
    A skeleton just as her property is,
    Laid in the chink that none may scan	
    And does she regret—if regret dust can—
    The vain things thought when she flourished this