Classic Poem

There is a vine that faintly crawls
Upon my faintly patterned walls,
A vine with leaves that have not grown
In any land that I have known,
A wind-caught vine that dimly brands
My memory—with its leaves like hands.

For sometimes when a pale light shines
And weaves as water through the vines,
Their weary leaves—I think I see
Things that are part, yet out of me,
And part of things I cannot say,
As broken dreams that haunt the day.

I know this shadow mesh has moved
Across some temple step, deep-grooved,
Where I, for a sharp moment, heard
Bells and dim prayers … The shadows stirred;
Or were they hands that beckoned far,
Beyond the rim of what dead star?

And when the moon slips whitely in
Along the wall, I hear a din
Of feet and horses, trumpet blare,
And see, perhaps, a lady fair
Ride past, her frail hands resting cold
On silk embossed with vines of gold.

And once, I heard a feeble cry,
An infant's wail, half sob, half sigh,
So far away—and yet I knew
A shoulder clothed in patterned blue,
And weary hands that quite beguiled
And comforted—what woeful child?

There is a vine that faintly crawls
Upon my faintly papered walls,
A vine with leaves that have not grown
In any land that I have known,
A wind-caught vine that dimly brands
My memory—with its leaves like hands.