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I THE IRIDESCENT vibrations of midsummer light | |
| Dancing, dancing, suddenly flickering and quivering, | |
| Like little feet or the movement of quick hands clapping, | |
| Or the rustle of furbelows, or the clash of polished gems. | |
| The sparkling mosaic of the mid-day light | 5 |
| Colliding, sliding, leaping and lingering: | |
| Oh, I could lie on my back all day, | |
| And mark the mad ballet of the midsummer sky. | |
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II Over the roof-tops race the shadows of clouds: | |
| Like horses the shadows of clouds charge down the street. | 10 |
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| Whirlpools of purple and gold, | |
| Winds from the mountains of cinnabar, | |
| Lacquered mandarin moments, palanquins swaying and balancing | |
| Amid the vermilion pavilions, against the jade balustrades; | |
| Glint of the glittering wings of dragon-flies in the light; | 15 |
| Silver filaments, golden flakes settling downwards; | |
| Rippling, quivering flutters; repulse and surrender, | |
| The sun broidered upon the rain, | |
| The rain rustling with the sun. | |
| Over the roof-tops race the shadows of clouds, | 20 |
| Like horses the shadows of clouds charge down the street. | |
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III The trees like great jade elephants | |
| Chained, stamp and shake ’gainst the gadflies of the breeze; | |
| The trees lunge and plunge, unruly elephants, | |
| The clouds are as crimson howdah-canopies, | 25 |
| The sunlight glints like the golden robe of a Shah. | |
| Would I were tossed on the wrinkled backs of those trees! | |
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IV O seeded grass, you army of little men | |
| Crawling up the low slopes with quivering quick blades of steel: | |
| You who storm millions of graves, tiny green tentacles of earth, | 30 |
| Interlace your tangled webs tightly over my heart | |
| And do not let me go: | |
| For I would lie here for ever and watch with one eye | |
| The pilgrimaging ants in your dull savage jungles, | |
| While with the other I see the long lines of the slope | 35 |
| Break in mid air, a wave surprisingly arrested; | |
| And above it, wavering, bodiless, colorless, unreal, | |
| The long thin lazy fingers of the heat. | |
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V The wind that drives the fine dry sand | |
| Over the strand: | 40 |
| The salt wind spinning arabesques | |
| With a wrinkled hand. | |
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| Labyrinths of shifting sand, | |
| The dancing dunes! | |
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| I will run and catch at the flying sand | 45 |
| And scatter it higher with my hand; | |
| I will wriggle like a long yellow snake over the beaches. | |
| I will lie curled up, sleeping, | |
| And the wind shall carry me | |
| Far inland. | 50 |
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| My breath is the music of the mad wind; | |
| Shrill piping, stamping of drunken feet: | |
| The fluttering, tattered broidery flung | |
| Over the dunes’ steep escarpments. | |
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| The fine dry sand that whistles | 55 |
| Down the long low beaches. | |
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VI Not noisily, but solemnly and pale, | |
| In a meditative ecstasy, you entered life, | |
| As for some strange rite, to which you alone held the clue. | |
| Child, life did not give rude strength to you; | 60 |
| From the beginning you would seem to have thrown away, | |
| As something cold and cumbersome, that armor men use against death. | |
| You would perchance look on death face to face and from him wrest the secret | |
| Whether his face wears oftenest a smile or no? | |
| Strange, old and silent being, there is something | 65 |
| Infinitely vast in your intense tininess: | |
| I think you could point out with a smile some curious star | |
| Far off in the heavens which no man has seen before. | |
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VII The morning is clean and blue, and the wind blows up the clouds: | |
| Now my thoughts, gathered from afar, | 70 |
| Once again in their patched armor, with rusty plumes and blunted swords, | |
| Move out to war. | |
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| Smoking our morning pipes we shall ride two and two | |
| Through the woods. | |
| For our old cause keeps us together, | 75 |
| And our hatred is so precious not death or defeat can break it. | |
| God willing, we shall this day meet that old enemy | |
| Who has given us so many a good beating. | |
| Thank God, we have a cause worth fighting for, | |
| And a cause worth losing, and a good song to sing! | 80 |
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VIII Oh, all you stars up yonder, | |
| Do you hear me? Beautiful, sullen eyes, | |
| I am tired of seeing you in the same old places, | |
| Night after night in the sky. | |
| I hoped you would dance—but after twenty-six years, | 85 |
| I find you are determined to stay as you are. | |
| So I make it known to you, stars clustered or solitary, | |
| That I want you to fall into my lap tonight. | |
| Come down, little stars, let me play with you! | |
| I will string you like beads, and shovel you together, | 90 |
| And wear you in my ears, and scatter you over people— | |
| And toss you back, like apples, as I choose. | |
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IX As I wandered over the city through the night | |
| I saw many strange things, | |
| But I have forgotten all | 95 |
| Except one painted face. | |
| Gaudy, shameless night-orchid, | |
| Heavy, flushed, sticky with narcotic perfume, | |
| There was something in you which made me prefer you | |
| Above all the feeble forget-me-nots of the world. | 100 |
| You were neither burnt-out nor pallid; | |
| There was plain, coarse, vulgar meaning in every line of you, | |
| And no make-believe: | |
| You were at least alive, | |
| When all the rest were but puppets of the night. | 105 |
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X Slowly along the lamp-emblazoned street, | |
| Amid the last sad drifting crowds of midnight | |
| Like lost souls wandering, | |
| Comes marching by solemnly | |
| As for some gem-bedecked ritual of old, | 110 |
| A monotonous procession of black carts | |
| Full-crowded with blood-red blossom: | |
| Scarlet geraniums | |
| Unfolding their fiery globes upon the night. | |
| These are the memories of day moulded in jagged flame: | 115 |
| Lust, joy, blood and death. | |
| With crushed hands, weary eyes, and hoarse clamor, | |
| We consecrate and acclaim them tumultuously | |
| Ere they pass, contemptuous, beyond the unpierced veil of silence. | |
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XI The flag let loose for a day of festivity: | 120 |
| Free desperate symbol of battle and desire, | |
| Leaping, lunging, tossing up the halliards: | |
| Below it a tumult of music, | |
| Above it the streaming wastes of the sky, | |
| Pinnacles of clouds, pyres of dawn, | 125 |
| Infinite effort, everlasting day. | |
| The immense flag waving | |
| Aloft in glory: | |
| Over seas and hilltops | |
| Transmitting its lightnings. | 130 |
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