Once It Was The Colour Of Saying

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1. Tri-Colour Poppies, you try to tell me, glowing there in the wheat; Poppies! Ah no! You mock me: It’s blood, I tell you, it’s blood. It’s gleaming wet in the grasses; it’s glist’ning warm in the wheat; It dabbles the ferns and the clover; it brims in an angry flood; It leaps to the startled heavens; […]...
2. Little Summer Poem Touching The Subject Of Faith Every summer I listen and look Under the sun’s brass and even Into the moonlight, but I can’t hear Anything, I can’t see anything Not the pale roots digging down, nor the green stalks muscling up, Nor the leaves Deepening their damp pleats, Nor the tassels making, Nor the shucks, nor the cobs. And still, […]...
3. The Four Winds The South wind said to the palms: My lovers sing me psalms; But are they as warm as those That Laylah’s lover knows? The North wind said to the firs: I have my worshippers; But are they as keen as hers? The East wind said to the cedars: My friends are no seceders; But is […]...
4. The Relapse My God, how gracious art thou! I had slipt Almost to hell, And on the verge of that dark, dreadful pit Did hear them yell, But O thy love! thy rich, almighty love That sav’d my soul, And checkt their fury, when I saw them move, And heard them howl; O my sole comfort, take […]...
5. Uphill DOES the road wind uphill all the way? Yes, to the very end. Will the day’s journey take the whole long day? From morn to night, my friend. But is there for the night a resting-place? A roof for when the slow, dark hours begin. May not the darkness hide it from my face? You […]...
6. The Oldest Child The night still frightens you. You know it is interminable And of vast, unimaginable dimensions. “That’s because His insomnia is permanent,” You’ve read some mystic say. Is it the point of His schoolboy’s compass That pricks your heart? Somewhere perhaps the lovers lie Under the dark cypress trees, Trembling with happiness, But here there’s only […]...
7. The House Of Dust: Part 04: 04: Counterpoint: Two Rooms He, in the room above, grown old and tired, She, in the room below-his floor her ceiling- Pursue their separate dreams. He turns his light, And throws himself on the bed, face down, in laughter. . . . She, by the window, smiles at a starlight night, His watch-the same he has heard these cycles […]...
8. Tears In Sleep All night the cocks crew, under a moon like day, And I, in the cage of sleep, on a stranger’s breast, Shed tears, like a task not to be put away – In the false light, false grief in my happy bed, A labor of tears, set against joy’s undoing. I would not wake at […]...
9. The Old Prison The rows of cells are unroofed, A flute for the wind’s mouth, Who comes with a breath of ice From the blue caves of the south. O dark and fierce day: The wind like an angry bee Hunts for the black honey In the pits of the hollow sea. Waves of shadow wash The empty […]...
10. Tor House If you should look for this place after a handful of lifetimes: Perhaps of my planted forest a few May stand yet, dark-leaved Australians or the coast cypress, haggard With storm-drift; but fire and the axe are devils. Look for foundations of sea-worn granite, my fingers had the art To make stone love stone, you […]...
11. The Birch-Tree at Loschwitz At Loschwitz above the city The air is sunny and chill; The birch-trees and the pine-trees Grow thick upon the hill. Lone and tall, with silver stem, A birch-tree stands apart; The passionate wind of spring-time Stirs in its leafy heart. I lean against the birch-tree, My arms around it twine; It pulses, and leaps, […]...
12. Prelude How could I love you more? I would give up Even that beauty I have loved too well That I might love you better. Alas, how poor the gifts that lovers give I can but give you of my flesh and strength, I can but give you these few passing days And passionate words that, […]...
13. Year that Trembled YEAR that trembled and reel’d beneath me! Your summer wind was warm enough-yet the air I breathed froze me; A thick gloom fell through the sunshine and darken’d me; Must I change my triumphant songs? said I to myself; Must I indeed learn to chant the cold dirges of the baffled? And sullen hymns of […]...
14. The Way That Lovers Use The Way that lovers use is this; They bow, catch hands, with never a word, And their lips meet, and they do kiss, ВЂ”So I have heard. They queerly find some healing so, And strange attainment in the touch; There is a secret lovers know, ВЂ”I have read as much. And theirs no longer joy […]...
15. One Year When I got to his marker, I sat on it, Like sitting on the edge of someone’s bed And I rubbed the smooth, speckled granite. I took some tears from my jaw and neck And started to wash a corner of his stone. Then a black and amber ant Ran out onto the granite, and […]...
16. The Song Of The Chattahoochee Out of the hills of Habersham, Down the valleys of Hall, I hurry amain to reach the plain, Run the rapid and leap the fall, Split at the rock and together again, Accept my bed, or narrow or wide, And flee from folly on every side With a lover’s pain to attain the plain Far […]...
17. The house where I was born (03) I woke up, it was the house where I was born, It was night, trees were crowding On all sides around our door, I was alone on the doorstep in the cold wind, No, not alone, for two huge beings Were speaking to each other above me, through me. One, behind, an old woman, stooped, […]...
18. The Widow Cold was the night wind, drifting fast the snows fell, Wide were the downs and shelterless and naked, When a poor Wanderer struggled on her journey Weary and way-sore. Drear were the downs, more dreary her reflexions; Cold was the night wind, colder was her bosom! She had no home, the world was all before […]...
19. Out in the Garden Out in the garden, Out in the windy, swinging dark, Under the trees and over the flower-beds, Over the grass and under the hedge border, Someone is sweeping, sweeping, Some old gardener. Out in the windy, swinging dark, Someone is secretly putting in order, Someone is creeping, creeping....
20. On Looking for Models The trees in time Have something else to do Besides their treeing. What is it. I’m a starving to death Man myself, and thirsty, thirsty By their fountains but I cannot drink Their mud and sunlight to be whole. I do not understand these presences That drink for months In the dirt, eat light, And […]...
21. Where Once The Waters Of Your Face Where once the waters of your face Spun to my screws, your dry ghost blows, The dead turns up its eye; Where once the mermen through your ice Pushed up their hair, the dry wind steers Through salt and root and roe. Where once your green knots sank their splice Into the tided cord, there […]...
22. The House Of Dust: Part 04: 07: The sun goes down in a cold pale flare of light The sun goes down in a cold pale flare of light. The trees grow dark: the shadows lean to the east: And lights wink out through the windows, one by one. A clamor of frosty sirens mourns at the night. Pale slate-grey clouds whirl up from the sunken sun. And the wandering one, the inquisitive […]...
23. LES BALLONS Against these turbid turquoise skies The light and luminous balloons Dip and drift like satin moons Drift like silken butterflies; Reel with every windy gust, Rise and reel like dancing girls, Float like strange transparent pearls, Fall and float like silver dust. Now to the low leaves they cling, Each with coy fantastic pose, Each […]...
24. The Gardener X: Let Your Work Be, Bride Let your work be, bride. Listen, the Guest has come. Do you hear, he is gently shaking The chain which fastens the door? See that your anklets make no loud Noise, and that your step is not over- Hurried at meeting him. Let your work be, bride, the guest Had come in the evening. No, […]...
25. Fear No More Fear no more the heat o’ the sun; Nor the furious winter’s rages, Thou thy worldly task hast done, Home art gone, and ta’en thy wages; Golden lads and girls all must, As chimney sweepers come to dust. Fear no more the frown of the great, Thou art past the tyrant’s stroke: Care no more […]...
26. Fidele FEAR no more the heat o’ the sun, Nor the furious winter’s rages; Thou thy worldly task hast done, Home art gone, and ta’en thy wages: Golden lads and girls all must, As chimney-sweepers, come to dust. Fear no more the frown o’ the great, Thou art past the tyrant’s stroke; Care no more to […]...
27. The House Of Dust: Part 01: 01: The sun goes down in a cold pale flare of light The sun goes down in a cold pale flare of light. The trees grow dark: the shadows lean to the east: And lights wink out through the windows, one by one. A clamor of frosty sirens mourns at the night. Pale slate-grey clouds whirl up from the sunken sun. And the wandering one, the inquisitive […]...
28. Our Eunuch Dreams I Our eunuch dreams, all seedless in the light, Of light and love the tempers of the heart, Whack their boys’ limbs, And, winding-footed in their shawl and sheet, Groom the dark brides, the widows of the night Fold in their arms. The shades of girls, all flavoured from their shrouds, When sunlight goes are […]...
29. The Listeners “Is there anybody there?” said the Traveller, Knocking on the moonlit door; And his horse in the silence champed the grass Of the forest’s ferny floor; And a bird flew up out of the turret, Above the Traveller’s head: And he smote upon the door again a second time; “Is there anybody there?” he said. […]...
30. In Hardwood Groves The same leaves over and over again! They fall from giving shade above To make one texture of faded brown And fit the earth like a leather glove. Before the leaves can mount again To fill the trees with another shade, They must go down past things coming up. They must go down into the […]...
31. Hymn To Life The hair falling on your forehead suddenly lifted. Suddenly something stirred on the ground. The trees are whispering in the dark. Your bare arms will be cold. Far off where we can’t see, the moon must be rising. It hasn’t reached us yet, slipping through the leaves to light up your shoulder. But I know […]...
32. Thinking For Berky In the late night listening from bed I have joined the ambulance or the patrol Screaming toward some drama, the kind of end That Berky must have some day, if she isn’t dead. The wildest of all, her father and mother cruel, Farming out there beyond the old stone quarry Where highschool lovers parked their […]...
33. The Ballad Of Father Gilligan The old priest Peter Gilligan Was weary night and day; For half his flock were in their beds, Or under green sods lay. Once, while he nodded on a chair, At the moth-hour of eve, Another poor man sent for him, And he began to grieve. ‘I have no rest, nor joy, nor peace, For […]...
34. The True Lover The lad came to the door at night, When lovers crown their vows, And whistled soft and out of sight In shadow of the boughs. “I shall not vex you with my face Henceforth, my love, for aye; So take me in your arms a space Before the cast is grey. “When I from hence […]...
35. The Rainy Day The day is cold, and dark, and dreary It rains, and the wind is never weary; The vine still clings to the mouldering wall, But at every gust the dead leaves fall, And the day is dark and dreary. My life is cold, and dark, and dreary; It rains, and the wind is never weary; […]...
36. The wind drew off The wind drew off Like hungry dogs Defeated of a bone Through fissures in Volcanic cloud The yellow lightning shone The trees held up Their mangled limbs Like animals in pain When Nature falls upon herself Beware an Austrian....
37. The Old Gray Wall Time out of mind I have stood Fronting the frost and the sun, That the dream of the world might endure, And the goodly will be done. Did the hand of the builder guess, As he laid me stone by stone, A heart in the granite lurked, Patient and fond as his own? Lovers have […]...
38. Michaelangelo Would I might wake in you the whirl-wind soul Of Michelangelo, who hewed the stone And Night and Day revealed, whose arm alone Could draw the face of God, the titan high Whose genius smote like lightning from the sky – And shall he mold like dead leaves in the grave? Nay he is in […]...
39. The Time I've Lost In Wooing The time I’ve lost in wooing, In watching and pursuing The light that lies In woman’s eyes, Has been my heart’s undoing. Tho’ Wisdom oft has sought me, I scorn’d the lore she brought me, My only books Were women’s looks, And folly’s all they taught me. Her smile when Beauty granted, I hung with […]...
40. I See The Boys Of Summer I I see the boys of summer in their ruin Lay the gold tithings barren, Setting no store by harvest, freeze the soils; There in their heat the winter floods Of frozen loves they fetch their girls, And drown the cargoed apples in their tides. These boys of light are curdlers in their folly, Sour […]...