The Beginning

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1. Impression Du Matin The Thames nocturne of blue and gold Changed to a Harmony in grey: A barge with ochre-coloured hay Dropt from the wharf: and chill and cold The yellow fog came creeping down The bridges, till the houses’ walls Seemed changed to shadows and St. Paul’s Loomed like a bubble o’er the town. Then suddenly arose […]...
2. End, Middle, Beginning There was an unwanted child. Aborted by three modern methods She hung on to the womb, Hooked onto I Building her house into it And it was to no avail, To black her out. At her birth She did not cry, Spanked indeed, But did not yell Instead snow fell out of her mouth. As […]...
3. In The Beginning Ever since those wondrous days of Creation Our Lord God sleeps: we are His sleep. And He accepted this in His indulgence, Resigned to rest among the distant stars. Our actions stopped Him from reacting, For His fist-tight hand is numbed by sleep, And the times brought in the age of heroes During which our […]...
4. And love has changed to kindliness When love has changed to kindliness Oh, love, our hungry lips, that press So tight that Time’s an old god’s dream Nodding in heaven, and whisper stuff Seven million years were not enough To think on after, make it seem Less than the breath of children playing, A blasphemy scarce worth the saying, A sorry […]...
5. To Lady Jane Romance was always young. You come today Just eight years old With marvellous dark hair. Younger than Dante found you When you turned His heart into the way That found the heavenly stair. Perhaps we must be strangers. I confess My soul this hour is Dante’s, And your care Should be for dolls Whose painted […]...
6. Lover's Gifts LIV: In the Beginning of Time In the beginning of time, there rose from the churning of God’s Dream two women. One is the dancer at the court of paradise, the Desired of men, she who laughs and plucks the minds of the wise From their cold meditations and of fools from their emptiness; and Scatters them like seeds with careless […]...
7. In The Beginning In the beginning was the three-pointed star, One smile of light across the empty face, One bough of bone across the rooting air, The substance forked that marrowed the first sun, And, burning ciphers on the round of space, Heaven and hell mixed as they spun. In the beginning was the pale signature, Three-syllabled and […]...
8. The Origin of the Harp Tis believed that this Harp, which I wake now for thee Was a Siren of old, who sung under the sea; And who often, at eve, through the bright waters roved, To meet, on the green shore, a youth whom she loved. But she loved him in vain, for he left her to weep, And […]...
9. All All And All The Dry Worlds Lever I All all and all the dry worlds lever, Stage of the ice, the solid ocean, All from the oil, the pound of lava. City of spring, the governed flower, Turns in the earth that turns the ashen Towns around on a wheel of fire. How now my flesh, my naked fellow, Dug of the […]...
10. I Shall Not Burn I have done with love and lust, I reck not for gold or fame; I await familiar dust These frail fingers to reclaim: Not for me the tiger flame. Not for me the furnace glow, Rage of fire and ashen doom; To sweet earth my bones bestow Where above a lowly tomb January roses bloom. […]...
11. The Call Out of the nothingness of sleep, The slow dreams of Eternity, There was a thunder on the deep: I came, because you called to me. I broke the Night’s primeval bars, I dared the old abysmal curse, And flashed through ranks of frightened stars Suddenly on the universe! The eternal silences were broken; Hell became […]...
12. In The Gold Room – A Harmony Her ivory hands on the ivory keys Strayed in a fitful fantasy, Like the silver gleam when the poplar trees Rustle their pale-leaves listlessly, Or the drifting foam of a restless sea When the waves show their teeth in the flying breeze. Her gold hair fell on the wall of gold Like the delicate gossamer […]...
13. Death Fugue Black milk of daybreak we drink it at sundown We drink it at noon in the morning we drink it at night We drink it and drink it We dig a grave in the breezes there one lies unconfined A man lives in the house he plays with the serpents he writes He writes when […]...
14. Son He hurried away, young heart of joy, under our Devon sky! And I watched him go, my beautiful boy, and a weary woman was I. For my hair is grey, and his was gold; he’d the best of his life to live; And I’d loved him so, and I’m old, I’m old; and he’s all […]...
15. The Ragged Wood O hurry where by water among the trees The delicate-stepping stag and his lady sigh, When they have but looked upon their images – Would none had ever loved but you and I! Or have you heard that sliding silver-shoed Pale silver-proud queen-woman of the sky, When the sun looked out of his golden hood? […]...
16. Wild Dreams Of A New Beginning There’s a breathless hush on the freeway tonight Beyond the ledges of concrete Restaurants fall into dreams With candlelight couples Lost Alexandria still burns In a billion lightbulbs Lives cross lives Idling at stoplights Beyond the cloverleaf turnoffs ‘Souls eat souls in the general emptiness’ A piano concerto comes out a kitchen window A yogi […]...
17. In Examination Lo! from quiet skies In through the window my Lord the Sun! And my eyes Were dazzled and drunk with the misty gold, The golden glory that drowned and crowned me Eddied and swayed through the room. . . Around me, To left and to right, Hunched figures and old, Dull blear-eyed scribbling fools, grew […]...
18. Tiare Tahiti Mamua, when our laughter ends, And hearts and bodies, brown as white, Are dust about the doors of friends, Or scent ablowing down the night, Then, oh! then, the wise agree, Comes our immortality. Mamua, there waits a land Hard for us to understand. Out of time, beyond the sun, All are one in Paradise, […]...
19. A Portrait in Georgia Hair-braided chestnut, Coiled like a lyncher’s rope, Eyes-fagots, Lips-old scars, or the first red blisters, Breath-the last sweet scent of cane, And her slim body, white as the ash Of black flesh after flame....
20. The Wayfarers Is it the hour? We leave this resting-place Made fair by one another for a while. Now, for a god-speed, one last mad embrace; The long road then, unlit by your faint smile. Ah! the long road! and you so far away! Oh, I’ll remember! but… each crawling day Will pale a little your scarlet […]...
21. Doubts When she sleeps, her soul, I know, Goes a wanderer on the air, Wings where I may never go, Leaves her lying, still and fair, Waiting, empty, laid aside, Like a dress upon a chair. . . . This I know, and yet I know Doubts that will not be denied. For if the soul […]...
22. The Temple Between us leapt a gold and scarlet flame. Into the hollow of the cupped, arched blue Of Heaven it rose. Its flickering tongues up-drew And vanished in the sunshine. How it came We guessed not, nor what thing could be its name. From each to each had sprung those sparks which flew Together into fire. […]...
23. Sunrise on the Coast Grey dawn on the sand-hills the night wind has drifted All night from the rollers a scent of the sea; With the dawn the grey fog his battalions has lifted, At the call of the morning they scatter and flee. Like mariners calling the roll of their number The sea-fowl put out to the infinite […]...
24. The Beginning “Where have I come from, where did you pick me up?” the baby asked Its mother. She answered, half crying, half laughing, and clasping the Baby to her breast- “You were hidden in my heart as its desire, my darling. You were in the dolls of my childhood’s games; and when with Clay I made […]...
25. Beginning The moon drops one or two feathers into the fiels. The dark wheat listens. Be still. Now. There they are, the moon’s young, trying Their wings. Between trees, a slender woman lifts up the lovely shadow Of her face, and now she steps into the air, now she is gone Wholly, into the air. I […]...
26. Tales in the beginning Tales in the beginning didn’t begin in the telling, They would have started no doubt, but not without A concrete bearing, a causal opening and a beckoning Ending (at least tacitly implied), otherwise devout Listeners would have opted out. For a tale to begin with no known point of origin, With no sequencing and no […]...
27. Beginning my Studies BEGINNING my studies, the first step pleas’d me so much, The mere fact, consciousness-these forms-the power of motion, The least insect or animal-the senses-eyesight-love; The first step, I say, aw’d me and pleas’d me so much, I have hardly gone, and hardly wish’d to go, any farther, But stop and loiter all the time, to […]...
28. Seashore On the seashore of endless worlds children meet. The infinite sky is motionless overhead And the restless water is boisterous. On the seashore of endless worlds The children meet with shouts and dances. They build their houses with sand And they play with empty shells. With withered leaves they weave their boats And smilingly float […]...
29. On the Seashore On the seashore of endless worlds children meet. The infinite sky is motionless overhead and the restless water is boisterous. On the seashore of endless worlds the children meet with shouts and dances. They build their houses with sand, and they play with empty shells. With withered leaves they weave their boats and smilingly float […]...
30. On Seeing A Piece Of Our Artillery Brought Into Action Be slowly lifted up, thou long black arm, Great gun towering towards Heaven, about to curse; Sway steep against them, and for years rehearse Huge imprecations like a blasting charm! Reach at that Arrogance which needs thy harm, And beat it down before its sins grow worse; Spend our resentment, cannon, yea, disburse Our gold […]...
31. Dining-Room Tea When you were there, and you, and you, Happiness crowned the night; I too, Laughing and looking, one of all, I watched the quivering lamplight fall On plate and flowers and pouring tea And cup and cloth; and they and we Flung all the dancing moments by With jest and glitter. Lip and eye Flashed […]...
32. The Cap And Bells The jester walked in the garden: The garden had fallen still; He bade his soul rise upward And stand on her window-sill. It rose in a straight blue garment, When owls began to call: It had grown wise-tongued by thinking Of a quiet and light footfall; But the young queen would not listen; She rose […]...
33. Jealousy When I see you, who were so wise and cool, Gazing with silly sickness on that fool You’ve given your love to, your adoring hands Touch his so intimately that each understands, I know, most hidden things; and when I know Your holiest dreams yield to the stupid bow Of his red lips, and that […]...
34. A Ballad of Death Kneel down, fair Love, and fill thyself with tears, Girdle thyself with sighing for a girth Upon the sides of mirth, Cover thy lips and eyelids, let thine ears Be filled with rumour of people sorrowing; Make thee soft raiment out of woven sighs Upon the flesh to cleave, Set pains therein and many a […]...
35. I Have Loved Hours At Sea I have loved hours at sea, gray cities, The fragile secret of a flower, Music, the making of a poem That gave me heaven for an hour; First stars above a snowy hill, Voices of people kindly and wise, And the great look of love, long hidden, Found at last in meeting eyes. I have […]...
36. Gold! Gold! Gold! Gold! Gold! Bright and yellow, hard and cold Molten, graven, hammered and rolled, Heavy to get and light to hold, Hoarded, bartered, bought and sold, Stolen, borrowed, squandered, doled, Spurned by young, but hung by old To the verge of a church yard mold; Price of many a crime untold. Gold! Gold! Gold! […]...
37. Queen Henrietta Maria (To Ellen Terry) In the lone tent, waiting for victory, She stands with eyes marred by the mists of pain, Like some wan lily overdrenched with rain: The clamorous clang of arms, the ensanguined sky, War’s ruin, and the wreck of chivalry To her proud soul no common fear can bring: Bravely she tarrieth for […]...
38. Symphony In Red Within the church The solemn priests advance, And the sunlight, stained by the heavy windows, Dyes a yet richer red the scarlet banners And the scarlet robes of the young boys that bear them, And the thoughts of one of these are far away, With carmined lips pouting an invitation, Are with his love – […]...
39. Gipsy The poppies that in Spring I sow, In rings of radiance gleam and glow, Like lords and ladies gay. A joy are they to dream beside, As in the air of eventide They flutter, dip and sway. For some are scarlet, some are gold, While some in fairy flame unfold, And some are rose and […]...
40. The Chilterns Your hands, my dear, adorable, Your lips of tenderness Oh, I’ve loved you faithfully and well, Three years, or a bit less. It wasn’t a success. Thank God, that’s done! and I’ll take the road, Quit of my youth and you, The Roman road to Wendover By Tring and Lilley Hoo, As a free man […]...