Well, it was two days after my husband died, Two days! And the earth still raw above him. And I was sweeping the carpet in their hall. In number four, the room with the red wall-paper,...
The days, the nights, flow one by one above us, The hours go silently over our lifted faces, We are like dreamers who walk beneath a sea. Beneath high walls we flow in the sun together....
'Number four, the girl who died on the table, The girl with golden hair,' The purpling body lies on the polished marble. We open the throat, and lay the thyroid bare . . . ...
Snow falls. The sky is grey, and sullenly glares With purple lights in the canyoned street. The fiery sign on the dark tower wreathes and flares . . . The trodden grass in the park is covered with white,...
As evening falls, And the yellow lights leap one by one Along high walls; And along black streets that glisten as if with rain, The muted city seems Like one in a restless sleep, who lies and dreams...
You read, what is it, then that you are reading? What music moves so silently in your mind? Your bright hand turns the page. I watch you from my window, unsuspected:...
The lamplit page is turned, the dream forgotten; The music changes tone, you wake, remember Deep worlds you lived before, deep worlds hereafter Of leaf on falling leaf, music on music,...
Of what she said to me that night, no matter. The strange thing came next day. My brain was full of music, something she played me; I couldn't remember it all, but phrases of it...
The cigarette-smoke loops and slides above us, Dipping and swirling as the waiter passes; You strike a match and stare upon the flame. The tiny fire leaps in your eyes a moment,...
This is the house. On one side there is darkness, On one side there is light. Into the darkness you may lift your lanterns, O, any number, it will still be night....
You see that porcelain ranged there in the window, Platters and soup-plates done with pale pink rosebuds, And tiny violets, and wreaths of ivy? See how the pattern clings to the gleaming edges!...
Wind blows. Snow falls. The great clock in its tower Ticks with reverberant coil and tolls the hour: At the deep sudden stroke the pigeons fly . . . The fine snow flutes the cracks between the flagstones....
We sit together and talk, or smoke in silence. You say (but use no words) 'this night is passing As other nights when we are dead will pass . . .' Perhaps I misconstrue you: you mean only,...
From time to time, lifting his eyes, he sees The soft blue starlight through the one small window, The moon above black trees, and clouds, and Venus, And turns to write . . . The clock, behind ticks softly. ...
What shall we talk of? Li Po? Hokusai? You narrow your long dark eyes to fascinate me; You smile a little. . . .Outside, the night goes by. I walk alone in a forest of ghostly trees . . ....
Now, when the moon slid under the cloud And the cold clear dark of starlight fell, He heard in his blood the well-known bell Tolling slowly in heaves of sound, Slowly beating, slowly beating,...
The half-shut doors through which we heard that music Are softly closed. Horns mutter down to silence. The stars whirl out, the night grows deep. Darkness settles upon us. A vague refrain...
'This envelope you say has something in it Which once belonged to your dead son, or something He knew, was fond of? Something he remembers? The soul flies far, and we can only call it...
The door is shut. She leaves the curtained office, And down the grey-walled stairs comes trembling slowly Towards the dazzling street. Her withered hand clings tightly to the railing....
Well, as you say, we live for small horizons: We move in crowds, we flow and talk together, Seeing so many eyes and hands and faces, So many mouths, and all with secret meanings,...