city

A MIDDLE-AGE INTERLUDE.

ROSA MUNDI; SEU, FULCITE ME FLORIBUS.
A CONCEIT OF MASTER GYSBRECHT,
CANON-REGULAR OF SAID JODOCUS-BY-THE-BAR,
YPRES CITY. CANTUQUE, Virgilius.
AND HATH OFTEN BEEN SUNG
AT HOCK-TIDE AND FESTIVALES. GAVISUS
ERAM, Jessides.

(It would seem to be a glimpse from the
burning of Jacques du Bourg-Mulay, at Paris,
A. D. 1314; as distorted by the refraction from
Flemish brain to brain, during the course of
a couple of centuries.)

[Molay was Grand Master of the Templars

Strange that the city thoroughfare,
Noisy and bustling all the day,
Should with the night renounce its care,
And lend itself to children's play!

Oh, girls are girls, and boys are boys,
And have been so since Abel's birth,
And shall be so till dolls and toys
Are with the children swept from earth.

The self-same sport that crowns the day
Of many a Syrian shepherd's son,
Beguiles the little lads at play
By night in stately Babylon.

I hear their voices in the street,

ONCE from the world of living men
I passed, by a strange fancy led,
To a still City of the Dead,
To call upon a citizen.
He had been famous in his day;
Much talked of, written of, and praised
For virtues my small soul amazed—
And yet I thought his heart was clay.

He was too full of grace for me:
His friends said, on a marble stone,
His soul sat somewhere near the Throne
I did not know; I called to see.

His name and fame were on the door—
A most superior tomb indeed,

I loved you in the morning, our kisses deep and warm,
your hair upon the pillow like a sleepy golden storm,
yes, many loved before us, I know that we are not new,
in city and in forest they smiled like me and you,
but now it's come to distances and both of us must try,
your eyes are soft with sorrow,
Hey, that's no way to say goodbye.

This war's dead heroes, who has seen them?
They rise in smoke above the burning city,
Faint clouds, dissolving into sky —

And who sifting the Libyan sand can find
The tracery of a human hand,
The faint impression of an absent mind,
The fade-out of a soldier's day dream?

You'll know your love no more, nor his sweet kisses —
He's forgotten you, girl, and in the idle sun
In long green grass that the east wind caresses
The seed of man is ravished by the corn.

There's many a schoolboy's bat and ball that are gathering dust at home,
For he hears a voice in the future call, and he trains for the war to come;
A serious light in his eyes is seen as he comes from the schoolhouse gate;
He keeps his kit and his rifle clean, and he sees that his back is straight.

But straight or crooked, or round, or lame – you may let these words take root;
As the time draws near for the sterner game, all boys should learn to shoot,
From the beardless youth to the grim grey-beard, let Australians ne'er forget,

From whose home secretly flies the sound of a jade flute?
It's lost amid the spring wind which fills Luoyang city.
In the middle of this nocturne I remember the snapped willow,
What person would not start to think of home!

We have a small sculpture of Henry James on our terrace in New York City.

Nothing would surprise him.
The beast in the jungle was what he saw--
Edith Wharton's obfuscating older brother. . .

He fled the demons
of Manhattan
for fear they would devour
his inner ones
(the ones who wrote the books)
& silence the stifled screams
of his protagonists.

To Europe
like a wandering Jew--
WASP that he was--
but with the Jew's
outsider's hunger. . .

face pressed up

They never crowned him, never dreamed his worth,
And let him go unlaurelled to the grave:
Hereafter there are guerdons for the brave,
Roses for martyrs who wear thorns on earth,
Balms for bruised hearts that languish in the dearth
Of human love. So let the grasses wave
Above him nameless. Little did he crave
Men's praises: modestly, with kindly mirth,
Not sad nor bitter, he accepted fate --
Drank deep of life, knew books, and hearts of men,
Cities and camps, and war's immortal woe,

The world is full of women
who'd tell me I should be ashamed of myself
if they had the chance. Quit dancing.
Get some self-respect
and a day job.
Right. And minimum wage,
and varicose veins, just standing
in one place for eight hours
behind a glass counter
bundled up to the neck, instead of
naked as a meat sandwich.
Selling gloves, or something.
Instead of what I do sell.
You have to have talent
to peddle a thing so nebulous
and without material form.
Exploited, they'd say. Yes, any way