TO PEGGY
WHEN our sweet bodies moulder under-ground,
Shut off from these bright waters and clear skies,
When we hear nothing but the sullen sound
Of dead flesh dropping slowly from the bone
And muffled fall of tongue and ears and eyes;
Perhaps, as each disintegrates alone,
Frail broken vials once brimmed with curious sense,
Our souls will pitch old Grossness from his throne,
And on the beat of unsubstantial wings
Soar to new ecstasies still more intense.
There the thin voice of horny, black-legged things
Shall thrill me as girls’ laughter thrills me here,
And the cold drops a passing storm-cloud flings
Be my strong wine, and crawling roots and clods
My trees and hills, and slugs swift fallow deer.
There I shall dote upon a sexless flower
By dream-ghosts planted in my dripping brain,
And suck from those cold petals subtler power
Than from your colder, whiter flesh could fall,
Most vile of girls and lovelier than all.
But in your tomb the deathless She will reign
And draw new lovers out of rotting sods
That your lithe body may for ever squirm
Beneath the strange embraces of the worm.
ADVICE TO A GIRL FROM THE WARS
WEEP for me but one day,
Dry then your eyes;
Think, is a heap of clay
Worth a maid’s sighs?
Sigh nine days if you can
For my waste blood;
Think then, you love a man
Whose face is mud;
Whose flesh and hair thrill not
At your faint touch;
Dear! limbs and brain will rot,
Dream not of such.
YEGOR
“What shall I write?” said Yegor.—Tchekov.