A BLOTCH of pallor stirs beneath the high
Square picture-dusk, the
window of dark sky.
A sound subdued in the darkness: tears!
As if a bird in difficulty up
the valley steers.
“Why have you gone to the window? Why don’t
you sleep?
How you have wakened me! But
why, why do
you
weep?”
“I am afraid of you, I am afraid, afraid!
There is something in you
destroys me — !”
“You have dreamed and are not awake, come
here
to
me.”
“No, I have
wakened. It is you, you are cruel to
me!”
“My dear!” — “Yes, yes, you are cruel to me. You
cast
A shadow over
my breasts that will kill me at last.”
“Come!” — “No, I’m a thing of life. I give
You armfuls of sunshine, and
you won’t let me live.”
“Nay, I’m too sleepy!” — “Ah, you are
horrible;
You
stand before me like ghosts, like a darkness
upright.”
“I!” — “How can you treat me so, and love
me?
My feet have
no hold, you take the sky from above me.”
“My dear, the night is soft and eternal, no
doubt
You love
it!” — “It is dark, it kills me, I am put
out.”
“My dear, when you cross the street in the sun
—
shine, surely
Your
own small night goes with you. Why treat
it so
poorly?”
“No, no, I dance in the sun, I’m a thing of life —
“
“Even then it is
dark behind you. Turn round,
my wife.”
“No, how cruel you are, you people the
sunshine
With
shadows!” — “With yours I people the
sunshine, yours and mine —
“
“In the darkness we all are gone, we are
gone
with the
trees
And the
restless river; — we are lost and gone
with all
these.”
“But I am myself, I have nothing to do with
these.”
“Come back
to bed, let us sleep on our mys- teries.
“Come to me here, and lay your body by mine,
And I will be all the shadow,
you the shine.
“Come, you are cold, the night has frightened
you.
Hark at the
river! It pants as it hurries through
“The pine-woods. How I love them so, in
their
mystery of
not-to-be.”
“ —
But let me be myself, not a river or a
tree.”
“Kiss me! How cold you are! — Your little
breasts
Are
bubbles of ice. Kiss me! — You know how
it
rests
“One to be quenched, to be given up, to be
gone
in the
dark;
To be blown
out, to let night dowse the spark.
“But never mind, my love. Nothing matters,
save sleep;
Save you, and me, and sleep;
all the rest will
keep.”