From "Preludes for Memnon"
XX
So, in the evening, to the simple cloister:
This place of boughs, where sounds of water, softly,
Lap on the stones. And this is what you are:
Here, in this dusty room, to which you climb
By four steep flights of stairs. The door is closed:
The furies of the city howl behind you:
The last bell plunges rock-like to the sea:
The horns of taxis wail in vain. You come
Once more, at evening, to this simple cloister;
Hushed by the quiet walls, you stand at peace.
What ferns of thought are these, the cool and green,
Dripping with moisture, that festoon these wall?
What water-lights are these, whose pallid rings
Dance with the leaves, or speckle the pale stones?
What spring is this, that bubbles the cold sand,
Urging the sluggish grains of white and gold?...
Peace. The delicious silence throngs with ghosts
Of wingèd sound and shadow. These are you.
Now in the evening, in the simple cloister,
You stand and wait; you stand and listen, waiting
For wingèd sounds and wingèd silences,
And long remembered shadows. Here the rock
Lets down its vine of many colored flowers:
Waiting for you, or waiting for the lizard
To move his lifted claw, or shift his eye
Quick as a jewel. Here the lizard waits
For the slow snake to slide among cold leaves.
And, on the bough that arches the deep pool,
Lapped in a sound of water, the brown thrush
Waits, too, and listens, till his silence makes
Silence as deep as song. And times becomes
A timeless crystal, an eternity,
In which the gone and coming are at peace.
What bird is this, whose silence fills the trees
With rich delight? What leaves and boughs are these,
What lizard, and what snake?... The bird is gone:
And while you wait, another comes and goes,-
Another and another; yet your eye,
Although it has not moved, can scarcely say
If birds have come and gone,-so quick, so brief,-
Or if the thrush who waits there is the same...
The snake and the lizard change, yet are the same:
The flowers, many-colored, on the vine,
Open and close their multitude of stars,-
Yet are the same.... And all these things are you.
Thus in the evening, in the simple cloister,
Eternity adds ring to ring, the darker
Beyond the brighter; and your silence fills
With such a world of worlds,- so still, so deep,-
As never voice could speak, whether it were
The ocean's or the bird's. The night comes on:
You wait and listen, in the darkened room,
To all these ghosts of change. And they are you.
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Source: Preludes for Memnon Blogspot. IMG: © N/A. AWIP: http://www.a-w-i-p.com/index.php/poetry/aJ5X
