Poems (Bibesco)/I

by Elizabeth Bibesco

I

Each ash is raised by some dead fire—
     A monument
To our lost fevers of desire,
     That now lie spent,
In the cold discipline of death,
     Cooling their breath.

But you, my love, with your light tread
     Of Ecstasy,
Will dance a measure to the dead,
     Who only see
The slow encroaching mists of grey,
That make a spirit's holiday.

Fire, the precursor of the ash,
     The wastrel flame,
Fashioned the darkness with a flash
     Until there came
Day's reasoning economy
     To set light free.

But you, my love, will burn the night
     With flickering eye,
Holding all darkness and all light
     In jeopardy,
Who know that heart and blood and bone
And dusk and fire and ash are one,