Most read ▸
The space of the world is immense, before me and around me;
If I turn quickly, I am terrified, feeling space surround me;
Like a man in a boat on very clear, deep water, space frightens and confounds me.
I see myself isolated in the universe, and wonder
What effect I can have. My hands wave under
The heavens like specks of dust that are floating asunder.
I hold myself up, and feel a big wind blowing
Me like a gadfly into the dusk, without my knowing
Whither or why or even how I am going.
So much there is outside me, so infinitely
Small am I, what matter if minutely
I beat my way, to be lost immediately?
How shall I flatter myself that I can do
Anything in such immensity? I am too
I saw the fog grow thick,
Which soon made blind my ken;
It made tall men of boys,
And giants of tall men.
It clutched my throat, I coughed;
Nothing was in my head
Except two heavy eyes
Like balls of burning lead.
And when it grew so black
That I could know no place,
I lost all judgment then,
Of distance and of space.
The street lamps, and the lights
Upon the halted cars,
Could either be on earth
Or be the heavenly stars.
Long vast shapes... cooled and flushed through with darkness....
Lidless windows
Glazed with a flashy luster
From some little pert cafe chirping up like a sparrow.
And down among iron guts
Piled silver
Throwing gray spatter of light... pale without heat...
Like the pallor of dead bodies.
I find no peace, and all my war is done.
I fear and hope. I burn and freeze like ice.
I fly above the wind, yet can I not arise;
And nought I have, and all the world I season.
That loseth nor locketh holdeth me in prison
And holdeth me not--yet can I scape no wise--
Nor letteth me live nor die at my device,
And yet of death it giveth me occasion.
Without eyen I see, and without tongue I plain.
I desire to perish, and yet I ask health.
I love another, and thus I hate myself.
I feed me in sorrow and laugh in all my pain;
Likewise displeaseth me both life and death,
And my delight is causer of this strife.
A Pit -- but Heaven over it --
And Heaven beside, and Heaven abroad,
And yet a Pit --
With Heaven over it.
To stir would be to slip --
To look would be to drop --
To dream -- to sap the Prop
That holds my chances up.
Ah! Pit! With Heaven over it!
The depth is all my thought --
I dare not ask my feet --
'Twould start us where we sit
So straight you'd scarce suspect
It was a Pit -- with fathoms under it --
Its Circuit just the same.
Seed -- summer -- tomb --
OUT in the dark over the snow
The fallow fawns invisible go
With the fallow doe;
And the winds blow
Fast as the stars are slow.
Stealthily the dark haunts round
And, when a lamp goes, without sound
At a swifter bound
Than the swiftest hound,
Arrives, and all else is drowned;
And I and star and wind and deer,
Are in the dark together,--near,
Yet far,--and fear
Drums on my ear
In that sage company drear.
How weak and little is the light,
In the morning light a line
Stretches forever. There my unlived life
Rises, and I resist,
Clinging to the steps of the throne.
Day lifts the darkness from the hills,
A bright blade cuts the reeds,
And my life, pitilessly demanding,
Rises forever in the morning light.
Toil, and grow rich,
What's that but to lie
With a foul witch
And after, drained dry,
To be brought
To the chamber where
Lies one long sought
With despair.
Oh, bend your eyes, nor send your glance about.
Oh, watch your feet, nor stray beyond the kerb.
Oh, bind your heart lest it find secrets out.
For thus no punishment
Of magic shall disturb
Your very great content.
Oh, shut your lips to words that are forbidden.
Oh, throw away your sword, nor think to fight.
Seek not the best, the best is better hidden.
Thus need you have no fear,
No terrible delight
Shall cross your path, my dear.
Call no man foe, but never love a stranger.
Build up no plan, nor any star pursue.
Go forth with crowds; in loneliness is danger.
Thus nothing God can send,
My soul lives in my body's house,
And you have both the house and her--
But sometimes she is less your own
Than a wild, gay adventurer;
A restless and an eager wraith,
How can I tell what she will do--
Oh, I am sure of my body's faith,
But what if my soul broke faith with you?
How still the night !
The air, a fragrance fallen
from unseen wings ;
The pine-trunks, stones of some dark
and secret temple ;
Venus, a lantern burning without flame.
But my soul is not still.
The wind blows bitterly ;
The pines groan on their rock-nourished
roots ;
The stars are blotted out.
Poison ivy crawls at its root,
I dare not approach it,
It has an air of hate.
One would say a man had been hanged to its branches,
It holds them in such a way.
The moon gets tangled in it,
A distant steeple seems to bark
From its belfry to the sky.
Something that no one ever loved,
Is buried here:
Some grey shape of deadly hate,
Crawls on the back fence just beyond.
Now I remember--once I went
Out by night too near this oak,
And a red cat suddenly leapt
From the dark and clawed my face.