| Harriet Monroe, ed. (18601936). Poetry: A Magazine of Verse. 191222. | | | | Slow Movement | | By William Carlos Williams |
| | From Root Buds ALL those treasures that lie in the little bolted box whose tiny space is | |
| Mightier than the room of the stars, being secret and filled with dreams: | |
| All those treasuresI hold them in my handare straining continually | |
| Against the sides and the lid and the two ends of the little box in which I guard them; | |
| Crying that there is no sun come among them this great while and that they weary of shining; | 5 |
| Calling me to fold back the lid of the little box and to give them sleep finally. | |
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| But the night I am hiding from them, dear friend, is far more desperate than their night! | |
| And so I take pity on them and pretend to have lost the key to the little house of my treasures; | |
| For they would die of weariness were I to open it, and not be merely faint and sleepy | |
| As they are now. | 10 | | | |
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