LULLED are the dazzling colours of the day,
And mild the heavens, burnt out like an ash.
Hungry and strange along the shadowed dusk
Walks Melancholy, and with bitter mouth
Sucks the last juices from the sun's ripe fruit.
Now can I sing the sickly lines of love
And of love's failure, spell my sorrows out
In the sad spaces of the gloaming night,
And stooping, huddled, hide me in the dark.
My words were fireless in the flaming sun,
And all the throats of flowers from their content
Puffed back my pinings proudly in my face
And bade. me give them tunes to make them dance. . . .
Lean, hungry, like my love the moon looks down
From the white solitudes of Heaven. All aghast
And sterile as the arms of my desire
She flings her light despairing on the sky.
The night is strange and still, for dropping tears,
Or burying hatred in a deep-dug grave.
And mild the heavens, burnt out like an ash.
Hungry and strange along the shadowed dusk
Walks Melancholy, and with bitter mouth
Sucks the last juices from the sun's ripe fruit.
Now can I sing the sickly lines of love
And of love's failure, spell my sorrows out
In the sad spaces of the gloaming night,
And stooping, huddled, hide me in the dark.
My words were fireless in the flaming sun,
And all the throats of flowers from their content
Puffed back my pinings proudly in my face
And bade. me give them tunes to make them dance. . . .
Lean, hungry, like my love the moon looks down
From the white solitudes of Heaven. All aghast
And sterile as the arms of my desire
She flings her light despairing on the sky.
The night is strange and still, for dropping tears,
Or burying hatred in a deep-dug grave.
1914
77
