Classic Poem

The darkness steals the forms of all the queens.
But oh, the palms of her two black hands are red!
It is Death I fear so much, it is not the dead —
Not this gray book, but the red and bloody scenes.

The lamps are white like snowdrops in the grass;
The town is like a churchyard, all so still
And gray, now night is here: nor will
Another torn red sunset come to pass.

And so I sit and turn the book of gray,
Feeling the shadows like a blind man reading,
All fearful lest I find some next word bleeding.
Nay, take my painted missal book away.