New Poems

AND all hours long, the townRoars like a beast in a caveThat is wounded thereAnd like to drown;While days rush, wave after waveOn its lair.An invisible woe unsealsThe flood, so it passes beyondAll bounds: the great old cityRecumbent roars as it feelsThe foamy paw of the pondReach from immensity.But all that it can doNow, as the tide rises, Is to listen and hear the grimWaves crash like thunder throughThe splintered streets, hear noisesRoll hollow in the interim.COMING AWAKEWHEN I woke, the lake-lights were quivering on thewall, The sunshine swam in a shoal across and across, And a hairy, big bee hung over the primulasIn the window, his body black fur, and the soundof him cross.There was something I ought to remember: andyetI did not remember. Why should I? The running lightsAnd the airy primulas, obliviousOf the impending bee-they were fair enoughsights.6FROM A COLLEGE WINDOWTHE glimmer of the limes, sun-heavy, sleeping, Goes trembling past me up the College wall.Below, the lawn, in soft blue shade is keeping, The daisy-froth quiescent, softly in thrall.Beyond the leaves that overhang the street, Along the flagged, clean pavement summer-white, Passes the world with shadows at their feetGoing left and right.Remote, although I hear the beggar's cough, See the woman's twinkling fingers tend him acoin, I sit absolved, assured I am better offBeyond a world I never want