My sister in her well-tailored silk blouse hands me the photo of my father in naval uniform and white hat. I say, “Oh, this is the one which Mama used to have on her dresser.”
My sister controls her face and furtively looks at my mother, a sad rag bag of a woman, lumpy and sagging everywhere, like a mattress at the Salvation Army, though with no holes or tears, and says, “No.”
Are you content, you pretty three-years’ wife? Are you content and satisfied to live On what your loving husband loves to give, And give to him your life?
Are you content with work, — to toil alone, To clean things dirty and to soil things clean; To be a kitchen-maid, be called a queen, —
Can these movements which move themselves be the substance of my attraction? Where does this thin green silk come from that covers my body? Surely any woman wearing such fabrics would move her body just to feel them touching every part of her.
Yet most of the women frown, or look away, or laugh stiffly. They are afraid of these materials and these movements in some way.
Lord, it’s not true That my faith is cooling. It’s just that people Are saying that candle smoke Has caused cancer in church mice. And I also worry that candle light Is too weak to reach your cloud.
As day did darken on the dewless grass, There, still, wi’ nwone a-come by me To stay a-while at hwome by me Within the house, all dumb by me, I zot me sad as the eventide did pass.
An’ there a win’blast shook the rattlèn door, An’ seemed, as win’ did mwoan without,
Through Alpine meadows soft-suffused With rain, where thick the crocus blows, Past the dark forges long disused, The mule-track from Saint Laurent goes. The bridge is cross'd, and slow we ride, Through forest, up the mountain-side.
The autumnal evening darkens round, The wind is up, and drives the rain; While, hark! far down, with strangled sound Doth the Dead Guier's stream complain, Where that wet smoke, among the woods, Over his boiling cauldron broods.
For God's sake hold your tongue, and let me love, Or chide my palsy, or my gout, My five gray hairs, or ruined fortune flout, With wealth your state, your mind with arts improve, Take you a course, get you a place, Observe his honor, or his grace, Or the king's real, or his stampèd face Contemplate; what you will, approve, So you will let me love.
Alas, alas, who's injured by my love? What merchant's ships have my sighs drowned? Who says my tears have overflowed his ground? When did my colds a forward spring remove? When did the heats which my veins fill
Here, where the world is quiet; Here, where all trouble seems Dead winds' and spent waves' riot In doubtful dreams of dreams; I watch the green field growing For reaping folk and sowing, For harvest-time and mowing, A sleepy world of streams.
I am tired of tears and laughter, And men that laugh and weep; Of what may come hereafter For men that sow to reap: I am weary of days and hours, Blown buds of barren flowers,
Before our lives divide for ever, While time is with us and hands are free, (Time, swift to fasten and swift to sever Hand from hand, as we stand by the sea) I will say no word that a man might say Whose whole life's love goes down in a day; For this could never have been; and never, Though the gods and the years relent, shall be.
Is it worth a tear, is it worth an hour, To think of things that are well outworn? Of fruitless husk and fugitive flower, The dream foregone and the deed forborne? Though joy be done with and grief be vain, Time shall not sever us wholly in twain;
As I was going down impassive Rivers, I no longer felt myself guided by haulers: Yelping redskins had taken them as targets And had nailed them naked to colored stakes.
I I weep for Adonais—he is dead! Oh, weep for Adonais! though our tears Thaw not the frost which binds so dear a head! And thou, sad Hour, selected from all years To mourn our loss, rouse thy obscure compeers, And teach them thine own sorrow, say: "With me Died Adonais; till the Future dares Forget the Past, his fate and fame shall be An echo and a light unto eternity!"
II Where wert thou, mighty Mother, when he lay, When thy Son lay, pierc'd by the shaft which flies In darkness? where was lorn Urania
I first discovered what was killing these men. I had three sons who worked with their father in the tunnel: Cecil, aged 23, Owen, aged 21, Shirley, aged 17. They used to work in a coal mine, not steady work for the mines were not going much of the time. A power Co. foreman learned that we made home brew, he formed a habit of dropping in evenings to drink, persuading the boys and my husband —
Wyatt resteth here, that quick could never rest; Whose heavenly gifts increased by disdain, And virtue sank the deeper in his breast; Such profit he by envy could obtain.
A head where wisdom mysteries did frame, Whose hammers beat still in that lively brain As on a stithy where that some work of fame
And in a little while we broke under the strain: suppurations ad nauseam, the wanting to be taller, though it‘s simply about being mysterious, i.e., not taller, like any tree in any forest. Mute, the pancake describes you. It had tiny roman numerals embedded in its rim. It was a pancake clock. They had ’em in those days, always getting smaller, which is why they finally became extinct.
It was a very little while and they had gone in front of it. It was that they had liked it would it bear. It was a very much adjoined a follower. Flower of an adding where a follower. Have I come in. Will in suggestion. They may like hours in catching. It is always a pleasure to remember. Have a habit. Any name will very well wear better. All who live round about there. Have a manner. The hotel François Ier. Just winter so. It is indubitably often that she is as denied to soften help to when it is in all in midst of which in vehemence to taken given in a bestowal show than left help in double. Having noticed often that it is newly noticed which makes older often. The world has become smaller and more beautiful. The world is grown smaller and more beautiful. That is it. Yes that is it.
The next morning I felt that our house had been lifted away from its foundation during the night, and was now adrift, though so heavy it drew a foot or more of whatever was buoying it up, not water but something cold and thin and clear, silence riffling its surface as the house began to turn on a strengthening current,
Beholde, o man! lyft up thyn eye and see What mortall peyne I suffre for thi trespace. With pietous voys I crye and sey to the: Beholde my woundes, behold my blody face, Beholde the rebukes that do me so manace, Beholde my enemyes that do me so despice, And how that I, to reforme the to grace, Was like a lambe offred in sacryfice.
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And geyn thi pryde behold my gret mekenesse; Geyn thyn envie behold my charité; Geyn thi leccherye behold my chast clennesse; Geyn thi covetyse behold my poverté.
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