While granite footsteps, grinding numb,Up the little hollow come.
Not to give in,Men will go onMaking vague love, kissing wanFaces. Trying to makeChildren with women,Trying to wakeHints of old hunger—bitterly breakFlesh that turns marble-hard—trying to takeLife in their arms for their brief comfort's sake.
Women will not move as moveThose confident of love:Hurt, like a torpid snake,Agony drags and stirs but cannot wake.
So they will pass their days,Fostering a child or two—giving namesOf half-remembered music, clamor, sound;Over hunched shoulders peering roundFor cold that creeping comes;Over and over saying tropic words,And calling babies after jungle-birds.
26
