what learned? do i see
snow and faces better
x-ray beats of water earth?
Do i slip out of
clouds & gestures faster
have honest tact?
hard to remember
how it was - the usual
toast cheese trying to sit
in wideness light
before minutes attack
moments of ecstasy among
night crickets waves
water terrors lonely days
Living side by side
we grew distant shouting
Between us,
some three hundred
miles of ice? —
It's not so much.
The far-away sky,
The white billow in distance,
And the expanse of Life and World.
I HEARD a cry in the night,
A thousand miles it came,
Sharp as a flash of light,
My name, my name!
It was your voice I heard,
You waked and loved me so--
I send you back this word,
I know, I know!
Through wild by-ways I come to you, my love,
Nor ask of those I meet the surest way,
What way I turn I cannot go astray
And miss you in my life. Though Fate may prove
A tardy guide she will not make delay
Leading me through strange seas and distant lands,
I'm coming still, though slowly, to your hands.
We'll meet one day.
There is so much to do, so little done,
In my life's space that I perforce did leave
Love at the moonlit trysting-place to grieve
Till fame and other little things were won.
I have missed much that I shall not retrieve,
Far will I wander yet with much to do.
Much will I spurn before I yet meet you,
So fair I can't deceive.
O little one away so far,
You cannot hear me when I sing.
You cannot tell me what you are,
I cannot tell you anything.
I saw a shadow on the ground
And heard a bluejay going by;
A shadow went across the ground,
And I looked up and saw the sky.
It hung up on the poplar tree,
But while I looked it did not stay;
It gave a tiny sort of jerk
And moved a little bit away.
And farther on and farther on
It moved and never seemed to stop.
I think it must be tied with chains
And something pulls it from the top.
It never has come down again,
And every time I look to see,
The sky is always slipping back
And getting far away from me.
The dome of the capitol looks to the Potomac river.
Out of haze over the sunset,
Out of a smoke rose gold:
One star shines over the sunset.
Night takes the dome and the river, the sun and the smoke rose gold,
The haze changes from sunset to star.
The pour of a thin silver struggles against the dark.
A star might call : It's a long way across.
You stand between the cedars and the green spruces.
Brilliantly naked.
And I think :
What are you,
A gem under sunlight ?
A poised spear ?
A jade cup ?
You flash in front of the cedars and the tall spruces.
And I see that you are fire —
Sacrificial fire on a jade altar.
Spear-tongue of white, ceremonial fire.
My eyes burn.
My hands are flames seeking you.
But you are as remote from me as a bright pointed planet
Set in the distance of an evening sky.