Reminder

Do you remember How night after night swept level and low Overhead, at home, and had not one star, Nor one narrow gate for the moon to go Forth to her field of November.

And you remember, How towards the north a red blot on the sky Burns like a blotch of anxiety Over the forges, and small flames ply Like ghosts the shadow of the ember.

Those were the days When it was awful autumn to me, When only there glowed on the dark of the sky The red reflection of her agony, My beloved smelting down in the blaze

Of death--my dearest Love who had borne, and was now leaving me. And I at the foot of her cross did suffer My own gethsemane.

So I came to you, And twice, after great kisses, I saw The rim of the moon divinely rise And strive to detach herself from the raw Blackened edge of the skies.

Strive to escape; With her whiteness revealing my sunken world Tall and loftily shadowed. But the moon Never magnolia-like unfurled Her white, her lamp-like shape.

For you told me no, And bade me not to ask for the dour Communion, offering--"a better thing." So I lay on your breast for an obscure hour Feeling your fingers go

Like a rhythmic breeze Over my hair, and tracing my brows, Till I knew you not from a little wind: --I wonder now if God allows Us only one moment his keys.

If only then You could have unlocked the moon on the night, And I baptized myself in the light Of your love; we both have entered then the white Pure passion, and never again.

I wonder if only You had taken me then, how different Life would have been: should I have spent Myself in waste, and you have bent Your pride, through being lonely?