The Winter sun goes down; quick chills the air
Outside my window.... While the West grows old,
I stand in Sanctuary, for I hold
Undying Faith, enshrined in golden hair.
SUBLIMINAL
I SHOULD like to be very lonely indeed—
Much lonelier than I am;
With humbleness, like the humbleness of a weed,
And simplicity like the sun, and no other need
But to hold me free of pose and pretence and sham.
And then I should like to think such silent things,
As only the flowers think;
I should want the whole world to be greenly a wall of shine,
And I, leaning over, swimming in dreams of mine,
As a flower floats over a brink.
I should like to be very lonely indeed—
So the world would draw around me,
Like a green cave flower lit, echo and shadow keyed,
With a door that to naught but a path of clouds would lead,
Or the bed in a blossoming tree.
And then I would pipe my thoughts so shyly out,
And watch them dance, dryad dressed;
I would talk to a bit of moss or an acorn sprout;
I should drink all the stars and follow the darkness out,
And bathe in the Sea of the West!
THE WALLED CITY
HERE is the mass, you see it astray and astruggle,
Deafened with noise, pushing and jestling along;
Pleasure and envy and greed, in a feverish juggle,
Outside the City of Song.
There are the Vapid, watching their hookah’s smoke-bubble;
There are the slothful, drunk at the wells of wrong;
At a scarlet booth is a Gypsy pleasing the rabble.
Outside the City of Song.
Here are the credulous, cheated to death by a thimble;
Here are the hungry stumbling on to the gong;
Here stands a lover grasping a treacherous symbol,
Outside the City of Song.