Mice & Other Poems

Excerpt

Mice

I seethe broken bodies of women and men,
Temples of God ruined; I see the claws
Of sinister Fate, from the reach of whose feline paws
Never are safe the bodies of women and men.
Almighty Cat, it sits on the Throne of the World,
With paw outstretched, grinning at us, the mice,
Who play our trivial games of virtue and vice,
And pray—to That which sits on the Throne of the World!
From our beginning till all is over and done,
Unwitting who watches, pursuing our personal ends,
Hither and thither we scamper....The paw descends;
The paw descends and all is over and done.
Hereis tranquillity and silvan shade;
For now, emerging from that waste of sand
Which was my life, I reach a fruitful glade,
A pool of water in a thirsty land.
Your gentle soul a well of beauty is,
And crystal clear the sunlit deeps thereof;
And from that fountain of unmeasured bliss
I draw the living water of your love.
Here is the goal of all my wandering,
Here is oblivion of my bitterness,
And here the temple where my heart shall sing
Your eyes that light me and your lips that bless.

The strength, the mellow music, and the laughter

Thesteadfast beauty of her eyes is balm,
And in her touch there's healing for my hurt;
She is unshaken as a vessel girt
Mid waters of unutterable calm.
The years grow fragrant with her fragrance: they,
Sipping her sweetness, leave her yet more sweet.
Laden with divers colours, at her feet
They shed their motley silks and go their way
Like withered dreams. So youth must follow after,
Youth that is brief and beauty that is grass;
But from her gentle soul shall never pass
The strength, the mellow music, and the laughter.
Burythe ashes. The life, the gleam
Of love is gone: we have killed with kisses
The fragile soul of rapture: this is
Only the hollow husk of a dream,
The bitter waking, the end thereof.
Come, bury the ashes of love.
The music falters; the flame is spent;
The vision is gone, the splendour faded,
Leaving only a pitiful jaded
Half-desire, and a discontent.
The end of love is a weary kiss—
Surely hate were better than this!

Du bist wie eine Blume

Solike a flower, so gentle,
So fair, so pure thou art,
That musing on thy beauty
Brings sadness to my heart.
I lay my hands, in spirit,
Upon thy gleaming hair,
Praying that God may keep thee
So sweet, so pure, so fair.

From the German of Heine

Fiveweary days...and I shall creep
Into the shadow of her hair
And of her loveliness drink deep
And lose my desolation there,
Feeling her cool lips quench my own.
Lying so still, we shall not dare
To let one murmur like a stone
Into the pool of silence fall.
All senses will be fused in one:
Peace will surround us with a wall
Of visible music, moments go
Melodiously by, and all
The stillness brim with beauty; so
Our hearts will whisper, throbbing fast:
'Must time undeviating flow
And bear this fragile moment past?'

Maître de Ballet

Ona gossamer thread
Of light that stretches
From dark to dark
Over the void
We giddily jig
To the mad music
The Master makes.
From the Green Room
He calls us forth,
Sensitive puppets,
Live automata,
And with a gesture
Sets us jerkily
Dancing the tightrope.
From a seat in the stalls
Of the cosmic theatre
Silently
He watches our antics.
When we call to him
'Master, Master!
Help, we are falling!'
Out of the darkness
Comes no word
....Only a chuckle.
We grudged not those that were dearer than all we possessed,
Lovers, brothers, sons.
Our hearts were full, and out of a full heart
We gave our beloved ones....