COLLECTED POEMS
When Fate, the mistress of iniquities,
The mad Queen-spinner of all discrepancies,
Beguiled the dyers of the dawn that day,
And even in such a curst and sodden way
Made my three colors one.
—So be it, and the way be as of old:
So be the weary truth again retold
Of great kings overthrown
Because they would be kings, and lastly kings alone.
Fling to each dog his bone.
Flags that are vanished, flags that are soiled and furled,
Say what will be the word when I am gone:
What learned little acrid archive men
Will burrow to find me out and burrow again,
But all for naught, unless
To find there was another Island. . . . Yes,
There are too many islands in this world,
There are too many rats, and there is too much rain.
50 three things are made plain
Between the sea and sky:
Three separate parts of one thing, which is Pain . . .
Bah, what a way to die!
To leave my Queen still spinning there on high,
Still wondering, I dare say,
To see me in this way . . .
Madame a sa tour monte
51 haut qu'elle pent monter
Like one of our Commissioners . . . ai! ai!
Prometheus and the women have to cry,
But no, not I ...
Faugh, what a way to die!
But who are these that come and go
Before me, shaking laurel as they pass?
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