Hawaiian Hilltop (Taggard collection)/Child Tropics
CHILD TROPICS
Never nowCan any river cool me, never canWhite silence ease me,nor the dew distilledEven in ginger-flowers satisfy, unless. . .
Out of abundance, in the lap of seas,Wind-widened out to the pure line of skiesGrew an old hunger, and behind my eyesIs always your lost crimson, your drunk bees,On my lips your drouth,And I am always reaching for the mouthOf the honey nights I've seen wasted in the south. . .
And then how many days I followed downThe tangled river banks, besideThe cool, white-bellied fishes, there to hangAbove the rocky pools and brownCupped, velvet mosses where they slept;—Often and often, crackling twigs I creptWaking them, when over them there wentMy timid shadow's leaning wonderment.
At night, sitting alone,Out on the steps between my warped tree and the stoneIts roots encircled sundering, I learnedHow the white stars burned. Washing my feet in chilly water, counting bruises, staring at the stars—The uneven dipper and red-bearded MarsCaught in my thorny tree,—
Oh, the hunger and wild sorrow in me!Those nights, those honey nights, with the rich swoonOf mango-flowers thick against the moon,And drawn across the coral reefs, the seaFlashing its foam-white flatness up to me!
Oh, no, this hunger is not new, not new,But older, hotter than when IPlunged in the fever marshes where there grewThe cool white ginger-buds, or when I flewDown the small valley, desolate and scarredBetween the red volcano hills and hardHarsh outlines of old trees that fedOn bitter soil until their sap was dead.
How like a fugitive our glad fulfillment goesOver hills before us!—leaving onlyEarth's abundance in ruins, earth that growsFruit for her children they can never eat,Food for the starved to see and honey sweetClusters of grapes dropping with the noon heat.
Never, now,Can any river cool me, never canWhite silence ease me, nor the dew distilledEven in ginger-flowers satisfy, unlessThis old quick thirst, this aching aridness,That urged us once, turn keen torment againWith beauty's wind a knife along the clearHot hills, unless we hearHer tiny plaint in every teeming rain,Unless her pollen comesHoney on our senses,and her drumsBeat in our wrists, until we turn as thenTo find each other radiant in her pain.