Classic Poem

Only the other night, it seems, I saw the wild geese trekking
In a black lanky wedge across the moon,
Their sharp frost-silvered wings flecking
The zenith. . . . And now in a fever of harsh maroon,
Burnt scarlet and tarnished bronze, the great ground whirl
Of leaves twists to a frenzied skirl
From autumnal pipes, the dervishes of brilliant blinding death
Shuddering, weaving, spinning — faster and fiercer — without breath!
O that last rich barbaric dizziness, the smoke of pearl,
The crimson axes of the heat hissing through,
The final lividly exultant blue
Crackle of dust! — and then the acrid silence and the hard green glitter of hoar-dew. . . .

Only the other night, it seems, only the other night
You passed with the passing of familiar light
From the sky and a certain hill: Oh, at your dying
There was a sound of wild geese crying, crying;

There was a sound of leaves that give up trying
To glow; and all wild beauty drifting, shifting
South, interminably south!
But I cannot give up remembering your swiftly quiet hands and the half-frightened hint of peace over your eyes, your mouth.