Hallo!

A poem by John Frederick Freeman

"Hallo, hallo!" impatiently he cried,
And I replied,
Sleepily, "Hallo--hallo!"
No sound then; and I stretched
My hand for the receiver, all my nerves
Tingling and listening.
My hand clutched nothing, and I lit
The candle--strange!
I could have sworn it was the shouting wire....
But no!
Besides, a bare and unfamiliar room
And he, why, long-forgotten, maybe dead.
Yet all around,
Filling the silence up with tiny sound,
A million tremulous thin echoings,
"Hallo--hallo--
Hallo!"