Flicker through the flames of the wide maw
rigid square bodies of men
opulence of childbearing women
slimness of young men, and girls
with small curved breasts.
(Loud as musketry rattles the sudden laughter of the dead.)
Thicker hotter the blood drips
from the cold brass lips.
Swift over grainless fields
swift over shellplowed lands
ever leaner swifter darker
bay the hounds of the dead,
before them drive the pale ones
white limbs scarred and blackened
laurel crushed in their cold fingers,
the spark quenched in their glazed eyes.
Thicker hotter the blood drips
from the avenging lips
of the brass God;
(and rattling loud as musketry
the laughter of the unsated dead).
The clouds have blotted the haggard moon.
A harsh wind shrills from the cities of the north
Ypres, Lille, Liège, Verdun,
and from the tainted valleys
the cross-scarred hills.
Over the long still plains
the wind out of the north
rattles the leaves of the liveoaks.
Cuatro Caminos
XV
The weazened old woman without teeth
who shivers on the windy street corner
displays her roasted chestnuts invitingly
like marriageable daughters.