They put Us far apart —
As separate as Sea
And Her unsown Peninsula —
We signified "These see" —
They took away our Eyes —
They thwarted Us with Guns —
"I see Thee" each responded straight
Through Telegraphic Signs —
With Dungeons — They devised —
But...
They say that "Time assuages" —
Time never did assuage —
An actual suffering strengthens
As Sinews do, with age —
Time is a Test of Trouble —
But not a Remedy —
If such it prove, it prove too
There was no Malady —
They shut me up in Prose —
As when a little Girl
They put me in the Closet —
Because they liked me "still" —
Still! Could themself have peeped —
And seen my Brain — go round —
They might as wise have lodged a Bird
For Treason — in the Pound —
Himself has but to will...
They talk as slow as Legends grow
No mushroom is their mind
But foliage of sterility
Too stolid for the wind —
They laugh as wise as Plots of Wit
Predestined to unfold
The point with bland prevision
Portentously untold.
They won't frown always — some sweet Day
When I forget to tease —
They'll recollect how cold I looked
And how I just said "Please."
Then They will hasten to the Door
To call the little Girl
Who cannot thank Them for the Ice
That filled the lisping full.
This Bauble was preferred of Bees —
By Butterflies admired
At Heavenly — Hopeless Distances —
Was justified of Bird —
Did Noon — enamel — in Herself
Was Summer to a Score
Who only knew of Universe —
It had created Her.
This Chasm, Sweet, opon my life
I mention it to you,
When Sunrise through a fissure drop
The Day must follow too.
If we demur, its gaping sides
Disclose as 'twere a Tomb
Ourself am lying straight wherein
The Favorite of Doom.
When it has just contained a Life
...
This Consciousness that is aware
Of Neighbors and the Sun
Will be the one aware of Death
And that itself alone
Is traversing the interval
Experience between
And most profound experiment
Appointed unto Men —
How adequate unto itself
Its properties shall be...
This dirty — little — Heart
Is freely mine.
I won it with a Bun —
A Freckled shrine —
But eligibly fair
To him who sees
The Visage of the Soul
And not the knees.
This docile one inter
While we who dare to live
Arraign the sunny brevity
That sparkled to the Grave.
On her departing span
No wilderness remain
As dauntless in the House of Death
As if it were her own —