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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=358614" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>The House Of Dust: Complete</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">I.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The sun goes down in a cold pale flare of light.<br>The trees grow dark: the shadows lean to the east:<br>And lights wink out through the windows, one by one.<br>A clamor of frosty sirens mourns at the night.<br>Pale slate-grey clouds whirl up from the sunken sun.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And the wandering one, the inquisitive dreamer of dreams,<br>The eternal asker of answers, stands in the street,<br>And lifts his palms for the first cold ghost of rain.<br>The purple lights leap down the hill before him.<br>The gorgeous night has begun again.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'I will ask them all, I will ask them all their dreams,<br>I will hold my light above them and seek their faces.<br>I will hear them whisper, invisible in their veins . . .'<br>The eternal asker of answers becomes as the darkness,<br>Or as a wind blown over a myriad forest,<br>Or as the numberless voices of long-drawn rains.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">We hear him and take him among us, like a wind of music,<br>Like the ghost of a music we have somewhere heard;<br>We crowd through the streets in a dazzle of pallid lamplight,<br>We pour in a sinister wave, ascend a stair,<br>With laughter and cry, and word upon murmured word;<br>We flow, we descend, we turn . . . and the eternal dreamer<br>Moves among us like light, like evening air . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Good-night! Good-night! Good-night! We go our ways,<br>The rain runs over the pavement before our feet,<br>The cold rain falls, the rain sings.<br>We walk, we run, we ride. We turn our faces<br>To what the eternal evening brings.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Our hands are hot and raw with the stones we have laid,<br>We have built a tower of stone high into the sky,<br>We have built a city of towers.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Our hands are light, they are singing with emptiness.<br>Our souls are light; they have shaken a burden of hours . . .<br>What did we build it for? Was it all a dream? . . .<br>Ghostly above us in lamplight the towers gleam . . .<br>And after a while they will fall to dust and rain;<br>Or else we will tear them down with impatient hands;<br>And hew rock out of the earth, and build them again.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>II.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">One, from his high bright window in a tower,<br>Leans out, as evening falls,<br>And sees the advancing curtain of the shower<br>Splashing its silver on roofs and walls:<br>Sees how, swift as a shadow, it crosses the city,<br>And murmurs beyond far walls to the sea,<br>Leaving a glimmer of water in the dark canyons,<br>And silver falling from eave and tree.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">One, from his high bright window, looking down,<br>Peers like a dreamer over the rain-bright town,<br>And thinks its towers are like a dream.<br>The western windows flame in the sun's last flare,<br>Pale roofs begin to gleam.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Looking down from a window high in a wall<br>He sees us all;<br>Lifting our pallid faces towards the rain,<br>Searching the sky, and going our ways again,<br>Standing in doorways, waiting under the trees . . .<br>There, in the high bright window he dreams, and sees<br>What we are blind to,—we who mass and crowd<br>From wall to wall in the darkening of a cloud.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The gulls drift slowly above the city of towers,<br>Over the roofs to the darkening sea they fly;<br>Night falls swiftly on an evening of rain.<br>The yellow lamps wink one by one again.<br>The towers reach higher and blacker against the sky.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>III.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">One, where the pale sea foamed at the yellow sand,<br>With wave upon slowly shattering wave,<br>Turned to the city of towers as evening fell;<br>And slowly walked by the darkening road toward it;<br>And saw how the towers darkened against the sky;<br>And across the distance heard the toll of a bell.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Along the darkening road he hurried alone,<br>With his eyes cast down,<br>And thought how the streets were hoarse with a tide of people,<br>With clamor of voices, and numberless faces . . .<br>And it seemed to him, of a sudden, that he would drown<br>Here in the quiet of evening air,<br>These empty and voiceless places . . .<br>And he hurried towards the city, to enter there.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Along the darkening road, between tall trees<br>That made a sinister whisper, loudly he walked.<br>Behind him, sea-gulls dipped over long grey seas.<br>Before him, numberless lovers smiled and talked.<br>And death was observed with sudden cries,<br>And birth with laughter and pain.<br>And the trees grew taller and blacker against the skies<br>And night came down again.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>IV.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Up high black walls, up sombre terraces,<br>Clinging like luminous birds to the sides of cliffs,<br>The yellow lights went climbing towards the sky.<br>From high black walls, gleaming vaguely with rain,<br>Each yellow light looked down like a golden eye.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">They trembled from coign to coign, and tower to tower,<br>Along high terraces quicker than dream they flew.<br>And some of them steadily glowed, and some soon vanished,<br>And some strange shadows threw.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And behind them all the ghosts of thoughts went moving,<br>Restlessly moving in each lamplit room,<br>From chair to mirror, from mirror to fire;<br>From some, the light was scarcely more than a gloom:<br>From some, a dazzling desire.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And there was one, beneath black eaves, who thought,<br>Combing with lifted arms her golden hair,<br>Of the lover who hurried towards her through the night;<br>And there was one who dreamed of a sudden death<br>As she blew out her light.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And there was one who turned from clamoring streets,<br>And walked in lamplit gardens among black trees,<br>And looked at the windy sky,<br>And thought with terror how stones and roots would freeze<br>And birds in the dead boughs cry . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And she hurried back, as snow fell, mixed with rain,<br>To mingle among the crowds again,<br>To jostle beneath blue lamps along the street;<br>And lost herself in the warm bright coiling dream,<br>With a sound of murmuring voices and shuffling feet.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And one, from his high bright window looking down<br>On luminous chasms that cleft the basalt town,<br>Hearing a sea-like murmur rise,<br>Desired to leave his dream, descend from the tower,<br>And drown in waves of shouts and laughter and cries.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>V.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The snow floats down upon us, mingled with rain . . .<br>It eddies around pale lilac lamps, and falls<br>Down golden-windowed walls.<br>We were all born of flesh, in a flare of pain,<br>We do not remember the red roots whence we rose,<br>But we know that we rose and walked, that after a while<br>We shall lie down again.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The snow floats down upon us, we turn, we turn,<br>Through gorges filled with light we sound and flow . . .<br>One is struck down and hurt, we crowd about him,<br>We bear him away, gaze after his listless body;<br>But whether he lives or dies we do not know.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">One of us sings in the street, and we listen to him;<br>The words ring over us like vague bells of sorrow.<br>He sings of a house he lived in long ago.<br>It is strange; this house of dust was the house I lived in;<br>The house you lived in, the house that all of us know.<br>And coiling slowly about him, and laughing at him,<br>And throwing him pennies, we bear away<br>A mournful echo of other times and places,<br>And follow a dream . . . a dream that will not stay.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Down long broad flights of lamplit stairs we flow;<br>Noisy, in scattered waves, crowding and shouting;<br>In broken slow cascades.<br>The gardens extend before us . . . We spread out swiftly;<br>Trees are above us, and darkness. The canyon fades . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And we recall, with a gleaming stab of sadness,<br>Vaguely and incoherently, some dream<br>Of a world we came from, a world of sun-blue hills . . .<br>A black wood whispers around us, green eyes gleam;<br>Someone cries in the forest, and someone kills.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">We flow to the east, to the white-lined shivering sea;<br>We reach to the west, where the whirling sun went down;<br>We close our eyes to music in bright cafees.<br>We diverge from clamorous streets to streets that are silent.<br>We loaf where the wind-spilled fountain plays.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And, growing tired, we turn aside at last,<br>Remember our secret selves, seek out our towers,<br>Lay weary hands on the banisters, and climb;<br>Climbing, each, to his little four-square dream<br>Of love or lust or beauty or death or crime.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>VI.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Over the darkened city, the city of towers,<br>The city of a thousand gates,<br>Over the gleaming terraced roofs, the huddled towers,<br>Over a somnolent whisper of loves and hates,<br>The slow wind flows, drearily streams and falls,<br>With a mournful sound down rain-dark walls.<br>On one side purples the lustrous dusk of the sea,<br>And dreams in white at the city's feet;<br>On one side sleep the plains, with heaped-up hills.<br>Oaks and beeches whisper in rings about it.<br>Above the trees are towers where dread bells beat.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The fisherman draws his streaming net from the sea<br>And sails toward the far-off city, that seems<br>Like one vague tower.<br>The dark bow plunges to foam on blue-black waves,<br>And shrill rain seethes like a ghostly music about him<br>In a quiet shower.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Rain with a shrill sings on the lapsing waves;<br>Rain thrills over the roofs again;<br>Like a shadow of shifting silver it crosses the city;<br>The lamps in the streets are streamed with rain;<br>And sparrows complain beneath deep eaves,<br>And among whirled leaves<br>The sea-gulls, blowing from tower to lower tower,<br>From wall to remoter wall,<br>Skim with the driven rain to the rising sea-sound<br>And close grey wings and fall . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">. . . Hearing great rain above me, I now remember<br>A girl who stood by the door and shut her eyes:<br>Her pale cheeks glistened with rain, she stood and shivered.<br>Into a forest of silver she vanished slowly . . .<br>Voices about me rise . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Voices clear and silvery, voices of raindrops,—<br>'We struck with silver claws, we struck her down.<br>We are the ghosts of the singing furies . . . '<br>A chorus of elfin voices blowing about me<br>Weaves to a babel of sound. Each cries a secret.<br>I run among them, reach out vain hands, and drown.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'I am the one who stood beside you and smiled,<br>Thinking your face so strangely young . . . '<br>'I am the one who loved you but did not dare.'<br>'I am the one you followed through crowded streets,<br>The one who escaped you, the one with red-gleamed hair.'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'I am the one you saw to-day, who fell<br>Senseless before you, hearing a certain bell:<br>A bell that broke great memories in my brain.'<br>'I am the one who passed unnoticed before you,<br>Invisible, in a cloud of secret pain.'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'I am the one who suddenly cried, beholding<br>The face of a certain man on the dazzling screen.<br>They wrote me that he was dead. It was long ago.<br>I walked in the streets for a long while, hearing nothing,<br>And returned to see it again. And it was so.'</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Weave, weave, weave, you streaks of rain!<br>I am dissolved and woven again . . .<br>Thousands of faces rise and vanish before me.<br>Thousands of voices weave in the rain.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'I am the one who rode beside you, blinking<br>At a dazzle of golden lights.<br>Tempests of music swept me: I was thinking<br>Of the gorgeous promise of certain nights:<br>Of the woman who suddenly smiled at me this day,<br>Smiled in a certain delicious sidelong way,<br>And turned, as she reached the door,<br>To smile once more . . .<br>Her hands are whiter than snow on midnight water.<br>Her throat is golden and full of golden laughter,<br>Her eyes are strange as the stealth of the moon<br>On a night in June . . .<br>She runs among whistling leaves; I hurry after;<br>She dances in dreams over white-waved water;<br>Her body is white and fragrant and cool,<br>Magnolia petals that float on a white-starred pool . . .<br>I have dreamed of her, dreaming for many nights<br>Of a broken music and golden lights,<br>Of broken webs of silver, heavily falling<br>Between my hands and their white desire:<br>And dark-leaved boughs, edged with a golden radiance,<br>Dipping to screen a fire . . .<br>I dream that I walk with her beneath high trees,<br>But as I lean to kiss her face,<br>She is blown aloft on wind, I catch at leaves,<br>And run in a moonless place;<br>And I hear a crashing of terrible rocks flung down,<br>And shattering trees and cracking walls,<br>And a net of intense white flame roars over the town,<br>And someone cries; and darkness falls . . .<br>But now she has leaned and smiled at me,<br>My veins are afire with music,<br>Her eyes have kissed me, my body is turned to light;<br>I shall dream to her secret heart tonight . . . '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">He rises and moves away, he says no word,<br>He folds his evening paper and turns away;<br>I rush through the dark with rows of lamplit faces;<br>Fire bells peal, and some of us turn to listen,<br>And some sit motionless in their accustomed places.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Cold rain lashes the car-roof, scurries in gusts,<br>Streams down the windows in waves and ripples of lustre;<br>The lamps in the streets are distorted and strange.<br>Someone takes his watch from his pocket and yawns.<br>One peers out in the night for the place to change.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Rain . . . rain . . . rain . . . we are buried in rain,<br>It will rain forever, the swift wheels hiss through water,<br>Pale sheets of water gleam in the windy street.<br>The pealing of bells is lost in a drive of rain-drops.<br>Remote and hurried the great bells beat.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'I am the one whom life so shrewdly betrayed,<br>Misfortune dogs me, it always hunted me down.<br>And to-day the woman I love lies dead.<br>I gave her roses, a ring with opals;<br>These hands have touched her head.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'I bound her to me in all soft ways,<br>I bound her to me in a net of days,<br>Yet now she has gone in silence and said no word.<br>How can we face these dazzling things, I ask you?<br>There is no use: we cry: and are not heard.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'They cover a body with roses . . . I shall not see it . . .<br>Must one return to the lifeless walls of a city<br>Whose soul is charred by fire? . . . '<br>His eyes are closed, his lips press tightly together.<br>Wheels hiss beneath us. He yields us our desire.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'No, do not stare so—he is weak with grief,<br>He cannot face you, he turns his eyes aside;<br>He is confused with pain.<br>I suffered this. I know. It was long ago . . .<br>He closes his eyes and drowns in death again.'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The wind hurls blows at the rain-starred glistening windows,<br>The wind shrills down from the half-seen walls.<br>We flow on the mournful wind in a dream of dying;<br>And at last a silence falls.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>VII.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Midnight; bells toll, and along the cloud-high towers<br>The golden lights go out . . .<br>The yellow windows darken, the shades are drawn,<br>In thousands of rooms we sleep, we await the dawn,<br>We lie face down, we dream,<br>We cry aloud with terror, half rise, or seem<br>To stare at the ceiling or walls . . .<br>Midnight . . . the last of shattering bell-notes falls.<br>A rush of silence whirls over the cloud-high towers,<br>A vortex of soundless hours.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'The bells have just struck twelve: I should be sleeping.<br>But I cannot delay any longer to write and tell you.<br>The woman is dead.<br>She died—you know the way. Just as we planned.<br>Smiling, with open sunlit eyes.<br>Smiling upon the outstretched fatal hand . . .'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">He folds his letter, steps softly down the stairs.<br>The doors are closed and silent. A gas-jet flares.<br>His shadow disturbs a shadow of balustrades.<br>The door swings shut behind. Night roars above him.<br>Into the night he fades.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Wind; wind; wind; carving the walls;<br>Blowing the water that gleams in the street;<br>Blowing the rain, the sleet.<br>In the dark alley, an old tree cracks and falls,<br>Oak-boughs moan in the haunted air;<br>Lamps blow down with a crash and tinkle of glass . . .<br>Darkness whistles . . . Wild hours pass . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And those whom sleep eludes lie wide-eyed, hearing<br>Above their heads a goblin night go by;<br>Children are waked, and cry,<br>The young girl hears the roar in her sleep, and dreams<br>That her lover is caught in a burning tower,<br>She clutches the pillow, she gasps for breath, she screams . . .<br>And then by degrees her breath grows quiet and slow,<br>She dreams of an evening, long ago:<br>Of colored lanterns balancing under trees,<br>Some of them softly catching afire;<br>And beneath the lanterns a motionless face she sees,<br>Golden with lamplight, smiling, serene . . .<br>The leaves are a pale and glittering green,<br>The sound of horns blows over the trampled grass,<br>Shadows of dancers pass . . .<br>The face smiles closer to hers, she tries to lean<br>Backward, away, the eyes burn close and strange,<br>The face is beginning to change,—<br>It is her lover, she no longer desires to resist,<br>She is held and kissed.<br>She closes her eyes, and melts in a seethe of flame . . .<br>With a smoking ghost of shame . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Wind, wind, wind . . . Wind in an enormous brain<br>Blowing dark thoughts like fallen leaves . . .<br>The wind shrieks, the wind grieves;<br>It dashes the leaves on walls, it whirls then again;<br>And the enormous sleeper vaguely and stupidly dreams<br>And desires to stir, to resist a ghost of pain.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">One, whom the city imprisoned because of his cunning,<br>Who dreamed for years in a tower,<br>Seizes this hour<br>Of tumult and wind. He files through the rusted bar,<br>Leans his face to the rain, laughs up at the night,<br>Slides down the knotted sheet, swings over the wall,<br>To fall to the street with a cat-like fall,<br>Slinks round a quavering rim of windy light,<br>And at last is gone,<br>Leaving his empty cell for the pallor of dawn . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The mother whose child was buried to-day<br>Turns her face to the window; her face is grey;<br>And all her body is cold with the coldness of rain.<br>He would have grown as easily as a tree,<br>He would have spread a pleasure of shade above her,<br>He would have been his father again . . .<br>His growth was ended by a freezing invisible shadow.<br>She lies, and does not move, and is stabbed by the rain.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Wind, wind, wind; we toss and dream;<br>We dream we are clouds and stars, blown in a stream:<br>Windows rattle above our beds;<br>We reach vague-gesturing hands, we lift our heads,<br>Hear sounds far off,—and dream, with quivering breath,<br>Our curious separate ways through life and death.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>VIII.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The white fog creeps from the cold sea over the city,<br>Over the pale grey tumbled towers,—<br>And settles among the roofs, the pale grey walls.<br>Along damp sinuous streets it crawls,<br>Curls like a dream among the motionless trees<br>And seems to freeze.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The fog slips ghostlike into a thousand rooms,<br>Whirls over sleeping faces,<br>Spins in an atomy dance round misty street lamps;<br>And blows in cloudy waves over open spaces . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And one from his high window, looking down,<br>Peers at the cloud-white town,<br>And thinks its island towers are like a dream . . .<br>It seems an enormous sleeper, within whose brain<br>Laborious shadows revolve and break and gleam.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"></div><div style="margin:10px 0">PART II.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>I.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The round red sun heaves darkly out of the sea.<br>The walls and towers are warmed and gleam.<br>Sounds go drowsily up from streets and wharves.<br>The city stirs like one that is half in dream.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And the mist flows up by dazzling walls and windows,<br>Where one by one we wake and rise.<br>We gaze at the pale grey lustrous sea a moment,<br>We rub the darkness from our eyes,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And face our thousand devious secret mornings . . .<br>And do not see how the pale mist, slowly ascending,<br>Shaped by the sun, shines like a white-robed dreamer<br>Compassionate over our towers bending.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">There, like one who gazes into a crystal,<br>He broods upon our city with sombre eyes;<br>He sees our secret fears vaguely unfolding,<br>Sees cloudy symbols shape to rise.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Each gleaming point of light is like a seed<br>Dilating swiftly to coiling fires.<br>Each cloud becomes a rapidly dimming face,<br>Each hurrying face records its strange desires.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">We descend our separate stairs toward the day,<br>Merge in the somnolent mass that fills the street,<br>Lift our eyes to the soft blue space of sky,<br>And walk by the well-known walls with accustomed feet.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>II. THE FULFILLED DREAM</div><div style="margin:10px 0">More towers must yet be built—more towers destroyed—<br>Great rocks hoisted in air;<br>And he must seek his bread in high pale sunlight<br>With gulls about him, and clouds just over his eyes . . .<br>And so he did not mention his dream of falling<br>But drank his coffee in silence, and heard in his ears<br>That horrible whistle of wind, and felt his breath<br>Sucked out of him, and saw the tower flash by<br>And the small tree swell beneath him . . .<br>He patted his boy on the head, and kissed his wife,<br>Looked quickly around the room, to remember it,—<br>And so went out . . . For once, he forgot his pail.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Something had changed—but it was not the street—<br>The street was just the same—it was himself.<br>Puddles flashed in the sun. In the pawn-shop door<br>The same old black cat winked green amber eyes;<br>The butcher stood by his window tying his apron;<br>The same men walked beside him, smoking pipes,<br>Reading the morning paper . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">He would not yield, he thought, and walk more slowly,<br>As if he knew for certain he walked to death:<br>But with his usual pace,—deliberate, firm,<br>Looking about him calmly, watching the world,<br>Taking his ease . . . Yet, when he thought again<br>Of the same dream, now dreamed three separate times,<br>Always the same, and heard that whistling wind,<br>And saw the windows flashing upward past him,—<br>He slowed his pace a little, and thought with horror<br>How monstrously that small tree thrust to meet him! . . .<br>He slowed his pace a little and remembered his wife.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Was forty, then, too old for work like this?<br>Why should it be? He'd never been afraid—<br>His eye was sure, his hand was steady . . .<br>But dreams had meanings.<br>He walked more slowly, and looked along the roofs,<br>All built by men, and saw the pale blue sky;<br>And suddenly he was dizzy with looking at it,<br>It seemed to whirl and swim,<br>It seemed the color of terror, of speed, of death . . .<br>He lowered his eyes to the stones, he walked more slowly;<br>His thoughts were blown and scattered like leaves;<br>He thought of the pail . . . Why, then, was it forgotten?<br>Because he would not need it?</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Then, just as he was grouping his thoughts again<br>About that drug-store corner, under an arc-lamp,<br>Where first he met the girl whom he would marry,—<br>That blue-eyed innocent girl, in a soft blouse,—<br>He waved his hand for signal, and up he went<br>In the dusty chute that hugged the wall;<br>Above the tree; from girdered floor to floor;<br>Above the flattening roofs, until the sea<br>Lay wide and waved before him . . . And then he stepped<br>Giddily out, from that security,<br>To the red rib of iron against the sky,<br>And walked along it, feeling it sing and tremble;<br>And looking down one instant, saw the tree<br>Just as he dreamed it was; and looked away,<br>And up again, feeling his blood go wild.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">He gave the signal; the long girder swung<br>Closer to him, dropped clanging into place,<br>Almost pushing him off. Pneumatic hammers<br>Began their madhouse clatter, the white-hot rivets<br>Were tossed from below and deftly caught in pails;<br>He signalled again, and wiped his mouth, and thought<br>A place so high in the air should be more quiet.<br>The tree, far down below, teased at his eyes,<br>Teased at the corners of them, until he looked,<br>And felt his body go suddenly small and light;<br>Felt his brain float off like a dwindling vapor;<br>And heard a whistle of wind, and saw a tree<br>Come plunging up to him, and thought to himself,<br>'By God—I'm done for now, the dream was right . . .'</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>III. INTERLUDE</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The warm sun dreams in the dust, the warm sun falls<br>On bright red roofs and walls;<br>The trees in the park exhale a ghost of rain;<br>We go from door to door in the streets again,<br>Talking, laughing, dreaming, turning our faces,<br>Recalling other times and places . . .<br>We crowd, not knowing why, around a gate,<br>We crowd together and wait,<br>A stretcher is carried out, voices are stilled,<br>The ambulance drives away.<br>We watch its roof flash by, hear someone say<br>'A man fell off the building and was killed—<br>Fell right into a barrel . . .' We turn again<br>Among the frightened eyes of white-faced men,<br>And go our separate ways, each bearing with him<br>A thing he tries, but vainly, to forget,—<br>A sickened crowd, a stretcher red and wet.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">A hurdy-gurdy sings in the crowded street,<br>The golden notes skip over the sunlit stones,<br>Wings are upon our feet.<br>The sun seems warmer, the winding street more bright,<br>Sparrows come whirring down in a cloud of light.<br>We bear our dreams among us, bear them all,<br>Like hurdy-gurdy music they rise and fall,<br>Climb to beauty and die.<br>The wandering lover dreams of his lover's mouth,<br>And smiles at the hostile sky.<br>The broker smokes his pipe, and sees a fortune.<br>The murderer hears a cry.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>IV. NIGHTMARE</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Draw three cards, and I will tell your future . . .<br>Draw three cards, and lay them down,<br>Rest your palms upon them, stare at the crystal,<br>And think of time . . . My father was a clown,<br>My mother was a gypsy out of Egypt;<br>And she was gotten with child in a strange way;<br>And I was born in a cold eclipse of the moon,<br>With the future in my eyes as clear as day.'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I sit before the gold-embroidered curtain<br>And think her face is like a wrinkled desert.<br>The crystal burns in lamplight beneath my eyes.<br>A dragon slowly coils on the scaly curtain.<br>Upon a scarlet cloth a white skull lies.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Your hand is on the hand that holds three lilies.<br>You will live long, love many times.<br>I see a dark girl here who once betrayed you.<br>I see a shadow of secret crimes.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'There was a man who came intent to kill you,<br>And hid behind a door and waited for you;<br>There was a woman who smiled at you and lied.<br>There was a golden girl who loved you, begged you,<br>Crawled after you, and died.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'There is a ghost of murder in your blood—<br>Coming or past, I know not which.<br>And here is danger—a woman with sea-green eyes,<br>And white-skinned as a witch . . .'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The words hiss into me, like raindrops falling<br>On sleepy fire . . . She smiles a meaning smile.<br>Suspicion eats my brain; I ask a question;<br>Something is creeping at me, something vile;</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And suddenly on the wall behind her head<br>I see a monstrous shadow strike and spread,<br>The lamp puffs out, a great blow crashes down.<br>I plunge through the curtain, run through dark to the street,<br>And hear swift steps retreat . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The shades are drawn, the door is locked behind me.<br>Behind the door I hear a hammer sounding.<br>I walk in a cloud of wonder; I am glad.<br>I mingle among the crowds; my heart is pounding;<br>You do not guess the adventure I have had! . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Yet you, too, all have had your dark adventures,<br>Your sudden adventures, or strange, or sweet . . .<br>My peril goes out from me, is blown among you.<br>We loiter, dreaming together, along the street.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>V. RETROSPECT</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Round white clouds roll slowly above the housetops,<br>Over the clear red roofs they flow and pass.<br>A flock of pigeons rises with blue wings flashing,<br>Rises with whistle of wings, hovers an instant,<br>And settles slowly again on the tarnished grass.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And one old man looks down from a dusty window<br>And sees the pigeons circling about the fountain<br>And desires once more to walk among those trees.<br>Lovers walk in the noontime by that fountain.<br>Pigeons dip their beaks to drink from the water.<br>And soon the pond must freeze.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The light wind blows to his ears a sound of laughter,<br>Young men shuffle their feet, loaf in the sunlight;<br>A girl's laugh rings like a silver bell.<br>But clearer than all these sounds is a sound he hears<br>More in his secret heart than in his ears,—<br>A hammer's steady crescendo, like a knell.<br>He hears the snarl of pineboards under the plane,<br>The rhythmic saw, and then the hammer again,—<br>Playing with delicate strokes that sombre scale . . .<br>And the fountain dwindles, the sunlight seems to pale.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Time is a dream, he thinks, a destroying dream;<br>It lays great cities in dust, it fills the seas;<br>It covers the face of beauty, and tumbles walls.<br>Where was the woman he loved? Where was his youth?<br>Where was the dream that burned his brain like fire?<br>Even a dream grows grey at last and falls.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">He opened his book once more, beside the window,<br>And read the printed words upon that page.<br>The sunlight touched his hand; his eyes moved slowly,<br>The quiet words enchanted time and age.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Death is never an ending, death is a change;<br>Death is beautiful, for death is strange;<br>Death is one dream out of another flowing;<br>Death is a chorded music, softly going<br>By sweet transition from key to richer key.<br>Death is a meeting place of sea and sea.'</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>VI. ADELE AND DAVIS</div><div style="margin:10px 0">She turned her head on the pillow, and cried once more.<br>And drawing a shaken breath, and closing her eyes,<br>To shut out, if she could, this dingy room,<br>The wigs and costumes scattered around the floor,—<br>Yellows and greens in the dark,—she walked again<br>Those nightmare streets which she had walked so often . . .<br>Here, at a certain corner, under an arc-lamp,<br>Blown by a bitter wind, she stopped and looked<br>In through the brilliant windows of a drug-store,<br>And wondered if she dared to ask for poison:<br>But it was late, few customers were there,<br>The eyes of all the clerks would freeze upon her,<br>And she would wilt, and cry . . . Here, by the river,<br>She listened to the water slapping the wall,<br>And felt queer fascination in its blackness:<br>But it was cold, the little waves looked cruel,<br>The stars were keen, and a windy dash of spray<br>Struck her cheek, and withered her veins . . . And so<br>She dragged herself once more to home, and bed.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Paul hadn't guessed it yet—though twice, already,<br>She'd fainted—once, the first time, on the stage.<br>So she must tell him soon—or else—get out . . .<br>How could she say it? That was the hideous thing.<br>She'd rather die than say it! . . . and all the trouble,<br>Months when she couldn't earn a cent, and then,<br>If he refused to marry her . . . well, what?<br>She saw him laughing, making a foolish joke,<br>His grey eyes turning quickly; and the words<br>Fled from her tongue . . . She saw him sitting silent,<br>Brooding over his morning coffee, maybe,<br>And tried again . . . she bit her lips, and trembled,<br>And looked away, and said . . . 'Say Paul, boy,—listen—<br>There's something I must tell you . . . ' There she stopped,<br>Wondering what he'd say . . . What would he say?<br>'Spring it, kid! Don't look so serious!'<br>'But what I've got to say—IS—serious!'<br>Then she could see how, suddenly, he would sober,<br>His eyes would darken, he'd look so terrifying—<br>He always did—and what could she do but cry?<br>Perhaps, then, he would guess—perhaps he wouldn't.<br>And if he didn't, but asked her 'What's the matter?'—<br>She knew she'd never tell—just say she was sick . . .<br>And after that, when would she dare again?<br>And what would he do—even suppose she told him?</div><div style="margin:10px 0">If it were Felix! If it were only Felix!—<br>She wouldn't mind so much. But as it was,<br>Bitterness choked her, she had half a mind<br>To pay out Felix for never having liked her,<br>By making people think that it was he . . .<br>She'd write a letter to someone, before she died,—<br>Just saying 'Felix did it—and wouldn't marry.'<br>And then she'd die . . . But that was hard on Paul . . .<br>Paul would never forgive her—he'd never forgive her!<br>Sometimes she almost thought Paul really loved her . . .<br>She saw him look reproachfully at her coffin.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And then she closed her eyes and walked again<br>Those nightmare streets that she had walked so often:<br>Under an arc-lamp swinging in the wind<br>She stood, and stared in through a drug-store window,<br>Watching a clerk wrap up a little pill-box.<br>But it was late. No customers were there,—<br>Pitiless eyes would freeze her secret in her!<br>And then—what poison would she dare to ask for?<br>And if they asked her why, what would she say?</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>VII. TWO LOVERS: OVERTONES</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Two lovers, here at the corner, by the steeple,<br>Two lovers blow together like music blowing:<br>And the crowd dissolves about them like a sea.<br>Recurring waves of sound break vaguely about them,<br>They drift from wall to wall, from tree to tree.<br>'Well, am I late?' Upward they look and laugh,<br>They look at the great clock's golden hands,<br>They laugh and talk, not knowing what they say:<br>Only, their words like music seem to play;<br>And seeming to walk, they tread strange sarabands.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'I brought you this . . . ' the soft words float like stars<br>Down the smooth heaven of her memory.<br>She stands again by a garden wall,<br>The peach tree is in bloom, pink blossoms fall,<br>Water sings from an opened tap, the bees<br>Glisten and murmur among the trees.<br>Someone calls from the house. She does not answer.<br>Backward she leans her head,<br>And dreamily smiles at the peach-tree leaves, wherethrough<br>She sees an infinite May sky spread<br>A vault profoundly blue.<br>The voice from the house fades far away,<br>The glistening leaves more vaguely ripple and sway . .<br>The tap is closed, the water ceases to hiss . . .<br>Silence . . . blue sky . . . and then, 'I brought you this . . . '<br>She turns again, and smiles . . . He does not know<br>She smiles from long ago . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">She turns to him and smiles . . . Sunlight above him<br>Roars like a vast invisible sea,<br>Gold is beaten before him, shrill bells of silver;<br>He is released of weight, his body is free,<br>He lifts his arms to swim,<br>Dark years like sinister tides coil under him . . .<br>The lazy sea-waves crumble along the beach<br>With a whirring sound like wind in bells,<br>He lies outstretched on the yellow wind-worn sands<br>Reaching his lazy hands<br>Among the golden grains and sea-white shells . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'One white rose . . . or is it pink, to-day?'<br>They pause and smile, not caring what they say,<br>If only they may talk.<br>The crowd flows past them like dividing waters.<br>Dreaming they stand, dreaming they walk.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Pink,—to-day!'—Face turns to dream-bright face,<br>Green leaves rise round them, sunshine settles upon them,<br>Water, in drops of silver, falls from the rose.<br>She smiles at a face that smiles through leaves from the mirror.<br>She breathes the fragrance; her dark eyes close . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Time is dissolved, it blows like a little dust:<br>Time, like a flurry of rain,<br>Patters and passes, starring the window-pane.<br>Once, long ago, one night,<br>She saw the lightning, with long blue quiver of light,<br>Ripping the darkness . . . and as she turned in terror<br>A soft face leaned above her, leaned softly down,<br>Softly around her a breath of roses was blown,<br>She sank in waves of quiet, she seemed to float<br>In a sea of silence . . . and soft steps grew remote . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Well, let us walk in the park . . . The sun is warm,<br>We'll sit on a bench and talk . . .' They turn and glide,<br>The crowd of faces wavers and breaks and flows.<br>'Look how the oak-tops turn to gold in the sunlight!<br>Look how the tower is changed and glows!'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Two lovers move in the crowd like a link of music,<br>We press upon them, we hold them, and let them pass;<br>A chord of music strikes us and straight we tremble;<br>We tremble like wind-blown grass.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">What was this dream we had, a dream of music,<br>Music that rose from the opening earth like magic<br>And shook its beauty upon us and died away?<br>The long cold streets extend once more before us.<br>The red sun drops, the walls grow grey.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>VIII. THE BOX WITH SILVER HANDLES</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Well,—it was two days after my husband died—<br>Two days! And the earth still raw above him.<br>And I was sweeping the carpet in their hall.<br>In number four—the room with the red wall-paper—<br>Some chorus girls and men were singing that song<br>'They'll soon be lighting candles<br>Round a box with silver handles'—and hearing them sing it<br>I started to cry. Just then he came along<br>And stopped on the stairs and turned and looked at me,<br>And took the cigar from his mouth and sort of smiled<br>And said, 'Say, what's the matter?' and then came down<br>Where I was leaning against the wall,<br>And touched my shoulder, and put his arm around me . . .<br>And I was so sad, thinking about it,—<br>Thinking that it was raining, and a cold night,<br>With Jim so unaccustomed to being dead,—<br>That I was happy to have him sympathize,<br>To feel his arm, and leaned against him and cried.<br>And before I knew it, he got me into a room<br>Where a table was set, and no one there,<br>And sat me down on a sofa, and held me close,<br>And talked to me, telling me not to cry,<br>That it was all right, he'd look after me,—<br>But not to cry, my eyes were getting red,<br>Which didn't make me pretty. And he was so nice,<br>That when he turned my face between his hands,<br>And looked at me, with those blue eyes of his,<br>And smiled, and leaned, and kissed me—<br>Somehow I couldn't tell him not to do it,<br>Somehow I didn't mind, I let him kiss me,<br>And closed my eyes! . . . Well, that was how it started.<br>For when my heart was eased with crying, and grief<br>Had passed and left me quiet, somehow it seemed<br>As if it wasn't honest to change my mind,<br>To send him away, or say I hadn't meant it—<br>And, anyway, it seemed so hard to explain!<br>And so we sat and talked, not talking much,<br>But meaning as much in silence as in words,<br>There in that empty room with palms about us,<br>That private dining-room . . . And as we sat there<br>I felt my future changing, day by day,<br>With unknown streets opening left and right,<br>New streets with farther lights, new taller houses,<br>Doors swinging into hallways filled with light,<br>Half-opened luminous windows, with white curtains<br>Streaming out in the night, and sudden music,—<br>And thinking of this, and through it half remembering<br>A quick and horrible death, my husband's eyes,<br>The broken-plastered walls, my boy asleep,—<br>It seemed as if my brain would break in two.<br>My voice began to tremble . . . and when I stood,<br>And told him I must go, and said good-night—<br>I couldn't see the end. How would it end?<br>Would he return to-morrow? Or would he not?<br>And did I want him to—or would I rather<br>Look for another job?—He took my shoulders<br>Between his hands, and looked down into my eyes,<br>And smiled, and said good-night. If he had kissed me,<br>That would have—well, I don't know; but he didn't . .<br>And so I went downstairs, then, half elated,<br>Hoping to close the door before that party<br>In number four should sing that song again—<br>'They'll soon be lighting candles round a box with silver handles'—<br>And sure enough, I did. I faced the darkness.<br>And my eyes were filled with tears. And I was happy.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>IX. INTERLUDE</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The days, the nights, flow one by one above us,<br>The hours go silently over our lifted faces,<br>We are like dreamers who walk beneath a sea.<br>Beneath high walls we flow in the sun together.<br>We sleep, we wake, we laugh, we pursue, we flee.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">We sit at tables and sip our morning coffee,<br>We read the papers for tales of lust or crime.<br>The door swings shut behind the latest comer.<br>We set our watches, regard the time.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">What have we done? I close my eyes, remember<br>The great machine whose sinister brain before me<br>Smote and smote with a rhythmic beat.<br>My hands have torn down walls, the stone and plaster.<br>I dropped great beams to the dusty street.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">My eyes are worn with measuring cloths of purple,<br>And golden cloths, and wavering cloths, and pale.<br>I dream of a crowd of faces, white with menace.<br>Hands reach up to tear me. My brain will fail.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Here, where the walls go down beneath our picks,<br>These walls whose windows gap against the sky,<br>Atom by atom of flesh and brain and marble<br>Will build a glittering tower before we die . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The young boy whistles, hurrying down the street,<br>The young girl hums beneath her breath.<br>One goes out to beauty, and does not know it.<br>And one goes out to death.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>X. SUDDEN DEATH</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Number four—the girl who died on the table—<br>The girl with golden hair—'<br>The purpling body lies on the polished marble.<br>We open the throat, and lay the thyroid bare . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">One, who held the ether-cone, remembers<br>Her dark blue frightened eyes.<br>He heard the sharp breath quiver, and saw her breast<br>More hurriedly fall and rise.<br>Her hands made futile gestures, she turned her head<br>Fighting for breath; her cheeks were flushed to scarlet,—<br>And, suddenly, she lay dead.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And all the dreams that hurried along her veins<br>Came to the darkness of a sudden wall.<br>Confusion ran among them, they whirled and clamored,<br>They fell, they rose, they struck, they shouted,<br>Till at last a pallor of silence hushed them all.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">What was her name? Where had she walked that morning?<br>Through what dark forest came her feet?<br>Along what sunlit walls, what peopled street?</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Backward he dreamed along a chain of days,<br>He saw her go her strange and secret ways,<br>Waking and sleeping, noon and night.<br>She sat by a mirror, braiding her golden hair.<br>She read a story by candlelight.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Her shadow ran before her along the street,<br>She walked with rhythmic feet,<br>Turned a corner, descended a stair.<br>She bought a paper, held it to scan the headlines,<br>Smiled for a moment at sea-gulls high in sunlight,<br>And drew deep breaths of air.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Days passed, bright clouds of days. Nights passed. And music<br>Murmured within the walls of lighted windows.<br>She lifted her face to the light and danced.<br>The dancers wreathed and grouped in moving patterns,<br>Clustered, receded, streamed, advanced.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Her dress was purple, her slippers were golden,<br>Her eyes were blue; and a purple orchid<br>Opened its golden heart on her breast . . .<br>She leaned to the surly languor of lazy music,<br>Leaned on her partner's arm to rest.<br>The violins were weaving a weft of silver,<br>The horns were weaving a lustrous brede of gold,<br>And time was caught in a glistening pattern,<br>Time, too elusive to hold . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Shadows of leaves fell over her face,—and sunlight:<br>She turned her face away.<br>Nearer she moved to a crouching darkness<br>With every step and day.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Death, who at first had thought of her only an instant,<br>At a great distance, across the night,<br>Smiled from a window upon her, and followed her slowly<br>From purple light to light.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Once, in her dreams, he spoke out clearly, crying,<br>'I am the murderer, death.<br>I am the lover who keeps his appointment<br>At the doors of breath!'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">She rose and stared at her own reflection,<br>Half dreading there to find<br>The dark-eyed ghost, waiting beside her,<br>Or reaching from behind<br>To lay pale hands upon her shoulders . . .<br>Or was this in her mind? . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">She combed her hair. The sunlight glimmered<br>Along the tossing strands.<br>Was there a stillness in this hair,—<br>A quiet in these hands?</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Death was a dream. It could not change these eyes,<br>Blow out their light, or turn this mouth to dust.<br>She combed her hair and sang. She would live forever.<br>Leaves flew past her window along a gust . . .<br>And graves were dug in the earth, and coffins passed,<br>And music ebbed with the ebbing hours.<br>And dreams went along her veins, and scattering clouds<br>Threw streaming shadows on walls and towers.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>XI.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Snow falls. The sky is grey, and sullenly glares<br>With purple lights in the canyoned street.<br>The fiery sign on the dark tower wreathes and flares . . .<br>The trodden grass in the park is covered with white,<br>The streets grow silent beneath our feet . . .<br>The city dreams, it forgets its past to-night.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And one, from his high bright window looking down<br>Over the enchanted whiteness of the town,<br>Seeing through whirls of white the vague grey towers,<br>Desires like this to forget what will not pass,<br>The littered papers, the dust, the tarnished grass,<br>Grey death, stale ugliness, and sodden hours.<br>Deep in his heart old bells are beaten again,<br>Slurred bells of grief and pain,<br>Dull echoes of hideous times and poisonous places.<br>He desires to drown in a cold white peace of snow.<br>He desires to forget a million faces . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">In one room breathes a woman who dies of hunger.<br>The clock ticks slowly and stops. And no one winds it.<br>In one room fade grey violets in a vase.<br>Snow flakes faintly hiss and melt on the window.<br>In one room, minute by minute, the flutist plays<br>The lamplit page of music, the tireless scales.<br>His hands are trembling, his short breath fails.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">In one room, silently, lover looks upon lover,<br>And thinks the air is fire.<br>The drunkard swears and touches the harlot's heartstrings<br>With the sudden hand of desire.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And one goes late in the streets, and thinks of murder;<br>And one lies staring, and thinks of death.<br>And one, who has suffered, clenches her hands despairing,<br>And holds her breath . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Who are all these, who flow in the veins of the city,<br>Coil and revolve and dream,<br>Vanish or gleam?<br>Some mount up to the brain and flower in fire.<br>Some are destroyed; some die; some slowly stream.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And the new are born who desire to destroy the old;<br>And fires are kindled and quenched; and dreams are broken,<br>And walls flung down . . .<br>And the slow night whirls in snow over towers of dreamers,<br>And whiteness hushes the town.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"></div><div style="margin:10px 0">PART III</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>I</div><div style="margin:10px 0">As evening falls,<br>And the yellow lights leap one by one<br>Along high walls;<br>And along black streets that glisten as if with rain,<br>The muted city seems<br>Like one in a restless sleep, who lies and dreams<br>Of vague desires, and memories, and half-forgotten pain . . .<br>Along dark veins, like lights the quick dreams run,<br>Flash, are extinguished, flash again,<br>To mingle and glow at last in the enormous brain<br>And die away . . .<br>As evening falls,<br>A dream dissolves these insubstantial walls,—<br>A myriad secretly gliding lights lie bare . . .<br>The lovers rise, the harlot combs her hair,<br>The dead man's face grows blue in the dizzy lamplight,<br>The watchman climbs the stair . . .<br>The bank defaulter leers at a chaos of figures,<br>And runs among them, and is beaten down;<br>The sick man coughs and hears the chisels ringing;<br>The tired clown<br>Sees the enormous crowd, a million faces,<br>Motionless in their places,<br>Ready to laugh, and seize, and crush and tear . . .<br>The dancer smooths her hair,<br>Laces her golden slippers, and runs through the door<br>To dance once more,<br>Hearing swift music like an enchantment rise,<br>Feeling the praise of a thousand eyes.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">As darkness falls<br>The walls grow luminous and warm, the walls<br>Tremble and glow with the lives within them moving,<br>Moving like music, secret and rich and warm.<br>How shall we live tonight? Where shall we turn?<br>To what new light or darkness yearn?<br>A thousand winding stairs lead down before us;<br>And one by one in myriads we descend<br>By lamplit flowered walls, long balustrades,<br>Through half-lit halls which reach no end.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>II. THE SCREEN MAIDEN</div><div style="margin:10px 0">You read—what is it, then that you are reading?<br>What music moves so silently in your mind?<br>Your bright hand turns the page.<br>I watch you from my window, unsuspected:<br>You move in an alien land, a silent age . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">. . . The poet—what was his name—? Tokkei—Tokkei—<br>The poet walked alone in a cold late rain,<br>And thought his grief was like the crying of sea-birds;<br>For his lover was dead, he never would love again.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Rain in the dreams of the mind—rain forever—<br>Rain in the sky of the heart—rain in the willows—<br>But then he saw this face, this face like flame,<br>This quiet lady, this portrait by Hiroshigi;<br>And took it home with him; and with it came</div><div style="margin:10px 0">What unexpected changes, subtle as weather!<br>The dark room, cold as rain,<br>Grew faintly fragrant, stirred with a stir of April,<br>Warmed its corners with light again,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And smoke of incense whirled about this portrait,<br>And the quiet lady there,<br>So young, so quietly smiling, with calm hands,<br>Seemed ready to loose her hair,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And smile, and lean from the picture, or say one word,<br>The word already clear,<br>Which seemed to rise like light between her eyelids . .<br>He held his breath to hear,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And smiled for shame, and drank a cup of wine,<br>And held a candle, and searched her face<br>Through all the little shadows, to see what secret<br>Might give so warm a grace . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Was it the quiet mouth, restrained a little?<br>The eyes, half-turned aside?<br>The jade ring on her wrist, still almost swinging? . . .<br>The secret was denied,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">He chose his favorite pen and drew these verses,<br>And slept; and as he slept<br>A dream came into his heart, his lover entered,<br>And chided him, and wept.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And in the morning, waking, he remembered,<br>And thought the dream was strange.<br>Why did his darkened lover rise from the garden?<br>He turned, and felt a change,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">As if a someone hidden smiled and watched him . . .<br>Yet there was only sunlight there.<br>Until he saw those young eyes, quietly smiling,<br>And held his breath to stare,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And could have sworn her cheek had turned—a little . . .<br>Had slightly turned away . . .<br>Sunlight dozed on the floor . . . He sat and wondered,<br>Nor left his room that day.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And that day, and for many days thereafter,<br>He sat alone, and thought<br>No lady had ever lived so beautiful<br>As Hiroshigi wrought . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Or if she lived, no matter in what country,<br>By what far river or hill or lonely sea,<br>He would look in every face until he found her . . .<br>There was no other as fair as she.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And before her quiet face he burned soft incense,<br>And brought her every day<br>Boughs of the peach, or almond, or snow-white cherry,<br>And somehow, she seemed to say,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">That silent lady, young, and quietly smiling,<br>That she was happy there;<br>And sometimes, seeing this, he started to tremble,<br>And desired to touch her hair,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">To lay his palm along her hand, touch faintly<br>With delicate finger-tips<br>The ghostly smile that seemed to hover and vanish<br>Upon her lips . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Until he knew he loved this quiet lady;<br>And night by night a dread<br>Leered at his dreams, for he knew that Hiroshigi<br>Was many centuries dead,—</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And the lady, too, was dead, and all who knew her . .<br>Dead, and long turned to dust . . .<br>The thin moon waxed and waned, and left him paler,<br>The peach leaves flew in a gust,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And he would surely have died; but there one day<br>A wise man, white with age,<br>Stared at the portrait, and said, 'This Hiroshigi<br>Knew more than archimage,—</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Cunningly drew the body, and called the spirit,<br>Till partly it entered there . . .<br>Sometimes, at death, it entered the portrait wholly . .<br>Do all I say with care,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And she you love may come to you when you call her . . . '<br>So then this ghost, Tokkei,<br>Ran in the sun, bought wine of a hundred merchants,<br>And alone at the end of day</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Entered the darkening room, and faced the portrait,<br>And saw the quiet eyes<br>Gleaming and young in the dusk, and held the wine-cup,<br>And knelt, and did not rise,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And said, aloud, 'Lo-san, will you drink this wine?'<br>Said it three times aloud.<br>And at the third the faint blue smoke of incense<br>Rose to the walls in a cloud,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And the lips moved faintly, and the eyes, and the calm hands stirred;<br>And suddenly, with a sigh,<br>The quiet lady came slowly down from the portrait,<br>And stood, while worlds went by,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And lifted her young white hands and took the wine cup;<br>And the poet trembled, and said,<br>'Lo-san, will you stay forever?'—'Yes, I will stay.'—<br>'But what when I am dead?'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'When you are dead your spirit will find my spirit,<br>And then we shall die no more.'<br>Music came down upon them, and spring returning,<br>They remembered worlds before,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And years went over the earth, and over the sea,<br>And lovers were born and spoke and died,<br>But forever in sunlight went these two immortal,<br>Tokkei and the quiet bride . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>III. HAUNTED CHAMBERS</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The lamplit page is turned, the dream forgotten;<br>The music changes tone, you wake, remember<br>Deep worlds you lived before,—deep worlds hereafter<br>Of leaf on falling leaf, music on music,<br>Rain and sorrow and wind and dust and laughter.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Helen was late and Miriam came too soon.<br>Joseph was dead, his wife and children starving.<br>Elaine was married and soon to have a child.<br>You dreamed last night of fiddler-crabs with fiddles;<br>They played a buzzing melody, and you smiled.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">To-morrow—what? And what of yesterday?<br>Through soundless labyrinths of dream you pass,<br>Through many doors to the one door of all.<br>Soon as it's opened we shall hear a music:<br>Or see a skeleton fall . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">We walk with you. Where is it that you lead us?<br>We climb the muffled stairs beneath high lanterns.<br>We descend again. We grope through darkened cells.<br>You say: this darkness, here, will slowly kill me.<br>It creeps and weighs upon me . . . Is full of bells.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">This is the thing remembered I would forget—<br>No matter where I go, how soft I tread,<br>This windy gesture menaces me with death.<br>Fatigue! it says, and points its finger at me;<br>Touches my throat and stops my breath.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">My fans—my jewels—the portrait of my husband—<br>The torn certificate for my daughter's grave—<br>These are but mortal seconds in immortal time.<br>They brush me, fade away: like drops of water.<br>They signify no crime.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Let us retrace our steps: I have deceived you:<br>Nothing is here I could not frankly tell you:<br>No hint of guilt, or faithlessness, or threat.<br>Dreams—they are madness. Staring eyes—illusion.<br>Let us return, hear music, and forget . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>IV. ILLICIT</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Of what she said to me that night—no matter.<br>The strange thing came next day.<br>My brain was full of music—something she played me—;<br>I couldn't remember it all, but phrases of it<br>Wreathed and wreathed among faint memories,<br>Seeking for something, trying to tell me something,<br>Urging to restlessness: verging on grief.<br>I tried to play the tune, from memory,—<br>But memory failed: the chords and discords climbed<br>And found no resolution—only hung there,<br>And left me morbid . . . Where, then, had I heard it? . . .<br>What secret dusty chamber was it hinting?<br>'Dust', it said, 'dust . . . and dust . . . and sunlight . .<br>A cold clear April evening . . . snow, bedraggled,<br>Rain-worn snow, dappling the hideous grass . . .<br>And someone walking alone; and someone saying<br>That all must end, for the time had come to go . . . '<br>These were the phrases . . . but behind, beneath them<br>A greater shadow moved: and in this shadow<br>I stood and guessed . . . Was it the blue-eyed lady?<br>The one who always danced in golden slippers—<br>And had I danced with her,—upon this music?<br>Or was it further back—the unplumbed twilight<br>Of childhood?—No—much recenter than that.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">You know, without my telling you, how sometimes<br>A word or name eludes you, and you seek it<br>Through running ghosts of shadow,—leaping at it,<br>Lying in wait for it to spring upon it,<br>Spreading faint snares for it of sense or sound:<br>Until, of a sudden, as if in a phantom forest,<br>You hear it, see it flash among the branches,<br>And scarcely knowing how, suddenly have it—<br>Well, it was so I followed down this music,<br>Glimpsing a face in darkness, hearing a cry,<br>Remembering days forgotten, moods exhausted,<br>Corners in sunlight, puddles reflecting stars—;<br>Until, of a sudden, and least of all suspected,<br>The thing resolved itself: and I remembered<br>An April afternoon, eight years ago—<br>Or was it nine?—no matter—call it nine—<br>A room in which the last of sunlight faded;<br>A vase of violets, fragrance in white curtains;<br>And, she who played the same thing later, playing.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">She played this tune. And in the middle of it<br>Abruptly broke it off, letting her hands<br>Fall in her lap. She sat there so a moment,<br>With shoulders drooped, then lifted up a rose,<br>One great white rose, wide opened like a lotos,<br>And pressed it to her cheek, and closed her eyes.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'You know—we've got to end this—Miriam loves you . . .<br>If she should ever know, or even guess it,—<br>What would she do?—Listen!—I'm not absurd . . .<br>I'm sure of it. If you had eyes, for women—<br>To understand them—which you've never had—<br>You'd know it too . . . ' So went this colloquy,<br>Half humorous, with undertones of pathos,<br>Half grave, half flippant . . . while her fingers, softly,<br>Felt for this tune, played it and let it fall,<br>Now note by singing note, now chord by chord,<br>Repeating phrases with a kind of pleasure . . .<br>Was it symbolic of the woman's weakness<br>That she could neither break it—nor conclude?<br>It paused . . . and wandered . . . paused again; while she,<br>Perplexed and tired, half told me I must go,—<br>Half asked me if I thought I ought to go . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Well, April passed with many other evenings,<br>Evenings like this, with later suns and warmer,<br>With violets always there, and fragrant curtains . . .<br>And she was right: and Miriam found it out . . .<br>And after that, when eight deep years had passed—<br>Or nine—we met once more,—by accident . . .<br>But was it just by accident, I wonder,<br>She played this tune?—Or what, then, was intended? . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>V. MELODY IN A RESTAURANT</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The cigarette-smoke loops and slides above us,<br>Dipping and swirling as the waiter passes;<br>You strike a match and stare upon the flame.<br>The tiny fire leaps in your eyes a moment,<br>And dwindles away as silently as it came.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">This melody, you say, has certain voices—<br>They rise like nereids from a river, singing,<br>Lift white faces, and dive to darkness again.<br>Wherever you go you bear this river with you:<br>A leaf falls,—and it flows, and you have pain.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">So says the tune to you—but what to me?<br>What to the waiter, as he pours your coffee,<br>The violinist who suavely draws his bow?<br>That man, who folds his paper, overhears it.<br>A thousand dreams revolve and fall and flow.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Some one there is who sees a virgin stepping<br>Down marble stairs to a deep tomb of roses:<br>At the last moment she lifts remembering eyes.<br>Green leaves blow down. The place is checked with shadows.<br>A long-drawn murmur of rain goes down the skies.<br>And oaks are stripped and bare, and smoke with lightning:<br>And clouds are blown and torn upon high forests,<br>And the great sea shakes its walls.<br>And then falls silence . . . And through long silence falls<br>This melody once more:<br>'Down endless stairs she goes, as once before.'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">So says the tune to him—but what to me?<br>What are the worlds I see?<br>What shapes fantastic, terrible dreams? . . .<br>I go my secret way, down secret alleys;<br>My errand is not so simple as it seems.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>VI. PORTRAIT OF ONE DEAD</div><div style="margin:10px 0">This is the house. On one side there is darkness,<br>On one side there is light.<br>Into the darkness you may lift your lanterns—<br>O, any number—it will still be night.<br>And here are echoing stairs to lead you downward<br>To long sonorous halls.<br>And here is spring forever at these windows,<br>With roses on the walls.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">This is her room. On one side there is music—<br>On one side not a sound.<br>At one step she could move from love to silence,<br>Feel myriad darkness coiling round.<br>And here are balconies from which she heard you,<br>Your steady footsteps on the stair.<br>And here the glass in which she saw your shadow<br>As she unbound her hair.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Here is the room—with ghostly walls dissolving—<br>The twilight room in which she called you 'lover';<br>And the floorless room in which she called you 'friend.'<br>So many times, in doubt, she ran between them!—<br>Through windy corridors of darkening end.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Here she could stand with one dim light above her<br>And hear far music, like a sea in caverns,<br>Murmur away at hollowed walls of stone.<br>And here, in a roofless room where it was raining,<br>She bore the patient sorrow of rain alone.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Your words were walls which suddenly froze around her.<br>Your words were windows,—large enough for moonlight,<br>Too small to let her through.<br>Your letters—fragrant cloisters faint with music.<br>The music that assuaged her there was you.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">How many times she heard your step ascending<br>Yet never saw your face!<br>She heard them turn again, ring slowly fainter,<br>Till silence swept the place.<br>Why had you gone? . . . The door, perhaps, mistaken . . .<br>You would go elsewhere. The deep walls were shaken.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">A certain rose-leaf—sent without intention—<br>Became, with time, a</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Conrad+Potter+Aiken">Conrad Potter Aiken</a><div class=q>
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<script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=358614" data-title="The House Of Dust: Complete de Conrad Potter Aiken" data-description="I.

The sun goes down in a cold pale flare of light.
The trees grow dark: the shadows lean to the east:
And lights wink out through the windows, one by one.
A clamor of frosty sirens mourns at the night.
Pale slate-grey clouds whirl up from the su..."></div>
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