Poems (Tree)/Zeppelins

by Iris Tree

ZEPPELINSMIDNIGHT

SUDDENLYShutting our lips upon a jestAs we are sipping thoughts from little glasses,A gun bursts thunder and the echoing streetsQuiver with startled terrors—How swift runs fear: quicksilver that is free!Now every muscle weakens, every pulseIs set at gallop-pace and every nerveStretched taut with horror and a wild revolt. . . .How sweetly spins the world to noise of music,How sweet to live life's arrogant adventure!Live in a vain world wracked with a thousand pangs,Limp in a dull street housed with crumbling dreams,To breathe and eat and sleep and love and sighA little longer, oh a little year!Forgotten prayers rise up in resurrection,And resolutions of new wondrous livesChoke up our hearts and fling us to our knees. . . .Worms creep in dreadful hunger from the ground,The lurid silent people loved by death,And peer into our eyes with sly forebodingsTo drag our body's glory from the light.Though all the world should fall into their cellsAnd lie within their larders shelf on shelf—Yet will I toss the sheets of dust away,Yet will I be the mistress of the sun!······1 A.M.Look how they struggle in a mist of fire,Those hunchbacked chimneys and distorted domes—Now gloat on Hell, the colour seems to roar,An army fierce upon its own destruction,A famished monster tearing in its clawsGigantic foods to glut its lean desire Digesting all the world! . . .Look at the eager people open-mouthedThat stand as foolish rabbits hypnotisedBy the uncoiling rhythm of a snake,Their earth adoring senses caught awhileIn the red whirlwind of ascending wings;Their spirits straining upward upon stringsLike kites and air balloons, but more grotesque,Lacking the ephemeral beauty of a toy—Yet for an hourDyed with the colour that their drabness fearsThey kiss the feet of beauty as she passesStarwards, tremendous in a coat of fire.······3 A.M.The dawn seems drained of blood so colourless—Slowly the river moves as though in sleepWhile silent bargesSlide from the mist like dreams;The intricate patterns of the scaffoldingAre drawn against the skyMore delicate than lace.All the shimmering lightsHave shrunk away from morningAs a blue peacock sheaves his starry tail. . . .I am alone, most utterly alone,More lonely than the last man in the worldStraying amid the dust of vanished lives.More lonely than a spirit stolen from heavenWho stands beside that nebulous cold riverDividing sleep from death,Eternity from time. . . .Nothing disturbs the white peace of the dawn,She brings no feverous memories of nightAnd sheds no tears. Only two hours agoFire walked in crimson armour through the cityPiercing the night's black tent with glittering javelins,While shrieks and whispered omens flew like batsAmong the silver foliage of the stars. . . .But rage has left no furrow in the sky,No wake of sparks across the placid water. . . .This is the ominous and sacred hourWhen priest-like the world kneelsBowed low toward the empty throne of day—Soon will the herald trumpet-blast be heardAnd the flamingo messengers will comeFlocking from out the burnished cage of sunrise. . . .This is the hour of nothing,Colourless and chillOblivion's hands are folded on the world,As sits an idol holding in his fingersA scentless lotus carven out of stone.······4 A.M.Leaving the dun river with hurried tapping feetAnd up the long uncomfortable streetWith eyes uninterested yet forced to see and readThe dingy notices once sharp and bright with greed,Now drear with want, that swear the Queen's HotelAnd Brown's Hotel and King's are doing wellA soldier and a beggar mock me as I go,The light steals after me, emerging slowAnd pale from the dim alleys shadow-crouched.I hurried by the drunkard as he slouchedFrom lamp-post unto lamp-post. . . . Then I sawCaught in the mirror of a tailor's doorMy own reflection as I hurried past,My flaring colours and my face aghast—The scarlet tassel of my hat that hung Limp as a spent flame, and my skirt that clungAbout my knees and fluttered at the back:An injured moth, with sulphur stripes and black,My bag flamboyant as a pillar-box;My frayed gilt fringe of hair and tarnished locks.Jagged and crude and swift I seemed to passPainted too brightly on. that temperate glass.. . . An omnibus from sudden corner reels:Silence lies mangled underneath the wheels.

1915