As the breath which rushes upwards from the nostrils of an immense
Life crouched across the globe, ready, if need be, to pounce
Across the space upon heaven’s high hostile eminence.
All round me, but far away, the night’s twin consciousness roars [p. xxxi]
With sounds that endlessly swell and sink like the storm of thought in the brain,
Lifting and falling like slow breaths taken, pulsing like oars
Immense that beat the blood of the night down its vein.
The night is immense and awful, Helen, and I am insect small
In the fur of this hill, clung on to the fur of shaggy, black heather.
A palpitant speck in the fur of the night, and afraid of all,