To a Grey Dress

There's a flutter of grey through the trees:

   Ah, the exquisite curves of her dress as she passes

   Fleet with her feet on the path where the grass is!

I see not her face, I but see

   The swift re-appearance, the flitting persistence—

   There!—of that flutter of grey in the distance.

It has flickered and fluttered away:

   What a teasing regret she has left in my day-dream,

   And what dreams of delight are the dreams that one may

         dream!

It was only a flutter of grey;

   But the vaguest of raiment's impossible chances

   Has set my heart beating the way of old dances.