child

Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the angels'
hierarchies? and even if one of them suddenly
pressed me against his heart, I would perish
in the embrace of his stronger existence.
For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror
which we are barely able to endure and are awed
because it serenely disdains to annihilate us.
Each single angel is terrifying.
And so I force myself, swallow and hold back
the surging call of my dark sobbing.
Oh, to whom can we turn for help?
Not angels, not humans;

Let them bury your big eyes
In the secret earth securely,
Your thin fingers, and your fair,
Soft, indefinite-colored hair,—
All of these in some way, surely,
From the secret earth shall rise;
Not for these I sit and stare,
Broken and bereft completely;
Your young flesh that sat so neatly
On your little bones will sweetly
Blossom in the air.

But your voice,—never the rushing
Of a river underground,
Not the rising of the wind
In the trees before the rain,
Not the woodcock's watery call,

And as long as I don’t see
You on the television
Or I don’t hear about
You on the radio

Or I don’t even read about
You on the national newspapers
Everything you are telling me
That it is happing to you

I would consider them
As a pure fantasy
As a pigmentation of your
Own imagination

I can even go as far as
To advice you to become a novelist
I can even get angry
If you still persist to talk to me

About the all situation
If you still want me to believe you

And wherefore have they come, this warlike band,
That o'er the ocean many a weary day
Have tossed; and now beside Suakim's Bay,
With faces stern and resolute, do stand,
Waking the desert's echoes with the drum --
Men of Australia, wherefore have ye come?
To keep the Puppet Khedive on the throne,
To strike a blow for tyranny and wrong,
To crush the weak and aid the oppressing strong!
Regardless of the hapless Fellah's moan,
To force the payment of the Hebrew loan,

I sat with a dynamiter at supper in a German saloon eating steak and onions.
And he laughed and told stories of his wife and children and the cause of labor and the working class.
It was laughter of an unshakable man knowing life to be a rich and red-blooded thing.
Yes, his laugh rang like the call of gray birds filled with a glory of joy ramming their winged flight through a rain storm.
His name was in many newspapers as an enemy of the nation and few keepers of churches or schools would open their doors to him.

Child of the Aztec gods,
how long must we listen here,
how long before we go?

The dust is deep on the lintels.
The dust is dark on the doors.
If the dreams shake our bones,
what can we say or do?

Since early morning we waited.
Since early, early morning, child.
There must be dreams on the way now.
There must be a song for our bones.

The dust gets deeper and darker.
Do the doors and lintels shudder?
How long must we listen here?
How long before we go?

We stand about this place -- we, the memories;
And shade our eyes because we dread to read:
"June 17th, 1884, aged 21 years and 3 days."
And all things are changed.
And we -- we, the memories, stand here for ourselves alone,
For no eye marks us, or would know why we are here.
Your husband is dead, your sister lives far away,
Your father is bent with age;
He has forgotten you, he scarcely leaves the house
Any more.
No one remembers your exquisite face,
Your lyric voice!

Naked and grey the Cotswolds stand
Beneath the summer sun,
And the stubble fields on either hand
Where Sour and Avon run.
There is no change in the patient land
That has bred us every one.

She should have passed in cloud and fire
And saved us from this sin
Of war--red war--'twixt child and sire,
Household and kith and kin,
In the heart of a sleepy Midland shire,
With the harvest scarcely in.

But there is no change as we meet at last
On the brow-head or the plain,

It fell about the Martinmas,
When the wind blew shrill and cauld,
Said Edom o' Gordon to his men,
'We maun draw to a hauld.

'And whatna hauld sall we draw to,
My merry men and me?
We will gae to the house of the Rodes,
To see that fair ladye.'

The lady stood on her castle wa',
Beheld baith dale and down;
There she was aware of a host of men
Came riding towards the town.

'O see ye not, my merry men a',
O see ye not what I see?
Methinks I see a host of men;
I marvel who they be.'

It fell about the Martinmas,
   When the wind blew shrill and cauld,
Said Edom o' Gordon to his men,
   'We maun draw to a hauld.

'And what a hauld sall we draw to,
   My merry men and me?
We will gae to the house o' the Rodes,
   To see that fair ladye.'

The lady stood on her castle wa',
   Beheld baith dale and down;
There she was ware of a host of men
   Cam riding towards the town.

'O see ye not, my merry men a',
   O see ye not what I see?
Methinks I see a host of men;