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Contemplative, Winifred Welles, in English Clear filters

ContemplativeWinifred Welles

Cobweb

It joins a dark pine to another tree; And shining through its bones a ray of sun Unearthed it like some graceful skeleton, Or an unfinished frame of faery As frail as words. Not even thought could be More carefully, more delicately spun — As fine a thread as that invisible one Of speech and silence between you and me. The spider lurks there blotched and poisonous. He is the monstrous god who can at will Belch beauty from a stomachful of spit; And dreaming of that silver binding us, Which Love unwinds and weaves, my heart grows still And cries that Love is lovely — isn't it ?
ContemplativeWinifred Welles

Humiliation

How nakedly an animal Lies down on earth to die, Unmindful of the shining air, And unashamed of sky. But men and women under roofs Draw shades and hush the floor, And furtively they lay their dead Behind a darkened door.
ContemplativeWinifred Welles

Lifetime

I am the river, I have been immense With hope, great as the inner heart of spring- The reeds have huddled to my whimpering Amid the noon-time's staleness and suspense. Between the ruins of magnificence. Stained and autumnal, mournfully I sing, And then among my white beards muttering Grow old, and sleep into indifference. I have no returning, onward is best. Close to the dark, sweet earth in every place. But with the sky's mark hidden in my breast. And a star's shadow falling on my face. Where shining spaces wait to fill with me, Death is the beautiful and bitter sea.
ContemplativeWinifred Welles

Trespasser

I am among the careless dead Who do not rise to see Why I should hurry through their flowers Beneath their willow tree, Nor lift their hands from off their breasts To beckon me. But though I run so lightly through The myrtle's rambling mass, And though my feet step silently Above the blowing grass. And though they do not stir or speak — They know I pass.
ContemplativeWinifred Welles

Driftwood

Life gave me these — The beauty that can only branch in trees Who are content, knowing the roots' securities — The strength to stand up straight and bear the wings Of a brave ship on her adventurings — The bitterness of being broken, being tossed And driven on the waters and the winds, and lost In desolation, mist and stinging foam, And being beaten back at last to home. Now love has kindled me — Strange that my beauty of a dear, green tree Should vanish into smoke and memory. Strange that the strength, magnificently mine. Should fall before the flame without a sign. But oh most strange that bitterness should be Drawn up in color after color out of me.
ContemplativeWinifred Welles

From a Chinese Vase

Roaming the lonely garden, he and I Pursue each other to the fountain's brim, And there grow quiet — woman and butterfly — The frail clouds beckon me, the flowers tempt him. My thoughts are rose-like, beautiful and bright, Folded precise as petals are, and wings Uplift my dreaming suddenly in flight, And fill my soul with jagged colorings. The waters tangle like a woman's hair Above the dim reflection of a face — He thinks those are his own lips laughing there, His own breasts curving under silk and lace. How shall we know our real selves, he and I, Which is the woman, which the butterfly?

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