Amy Lowell Poems shared by Patrícia Marques

The Taxi

“When I go away from you
The world beats dead
Like a slackened drum.
I call out for you against the jutted stars
And shout into the ridges of the wind.
Streets coming fast,
One after the other,
Wedge you away from me,
And the lamps of the city prick my eyes
So that I can no longer see your face.
Why should I leave you,
To wound myself upon the sharp edges of the night?”

The Basket

III

"Go home, now, Peter.  To-night is full moon.  I must be alone."

"How soon the moon is full again!  Annette, let me stay.  Indeed, Dear Love,
I shall not go away.  My God, but you keep me starved!  You write
`No Entrance Here', over all the doors.  Is it not strange, my Dear,
that loving, yet you deny me entrance everywhere.  Would marriage
strike you blind, or, hating bonds as you do, why should I be denied
the rights of loving if I leave you free?  You want the whole of me,
you pick my brains to rest you, but you give me not one heart-beat.
Oh, forgive me, Sweet!  I suffer in my loving, and you know it.  I cannot
feed my life on being a poet.  Let me stay."

"As you please, poor Peter, but it will hurt me if you do.  It will
crush your heart and squeeze the love out."

He answered gruffly, "I know what I'm about."

"Only remember one thing from to-night.  My work is taxing and I must
have sight!  I must!"

(...)

V

The air is of silver and pearl, for the night is liquid with moonlight.
How the ruin glistens, like a palace of ice!  Only two black holes swallow
the brilliance of the moon.  Deflowered windows, sockets without sight.

A man stands before the house.  He sees the silver-blue moonlight,
and set in it, over his head, staring and flickering, eyes of geranium red.

Annette!

The Forsaken

“Holy Mother of God, Merciful Mary.  Hear me!  I am very weary.  I have come
from a village miles away, all day I have been coming, and I ache for such
far roaming.  I cannot walk as light as I used, and my thoughts grow confused.
I am heavier than I was.  Mary Mother, you know the cause!

Beautiful Holy Lady, take my shame away from me!  Let this fear
be only seeming, let it be that I am dreaming.  For months I have hoped
it was so, now I am afraid I know.  Lady, why should this be shame,
just because I haven't got his name.  He loved me, yes, Lady, he did,
and he couldn't keep it hid.  We meant to marry.  Why did he die?

That day when they told me he had gone down in the avalanche, and could not
be found until the snow melted in Spring, I did nothing.  I could not cry.
Why should he die?  Why should he die and his child live?  His little child
alive in me, for my comfort.  No, Good God, for my misery!  I cannot face
the shame, to be a mother, and not married, and the poor child to be reviled
for having no father.  Merciful Mother, Holy Virgin, take away this sin I did.
Let the baby not be.  Only take the stigma off of me!

I have told no one but you, Holy Mary.  My mother would call me "whore",
and spit upon me; the priest would have me repent, and have
the rest of my life spent in a convent.  I am no whore, no bad woman,
he loved me, and we were to be married.  I carried him always in my heart,
what did it matter if I gave him the least part of me too?  You were a virgin,
Holy Mother, but you had a son, you know there are times when a woman
must give all.  There is some call to give and hold back nothing.
I swear I obeyed God then, and this child who lives in me is the sign.
What am I saying?  He is dead, my beautiful, strong man!  I shall never
feel him caress me again.  This is the only baby I shall have.
Oh, Holy Virgin, protect my baby!  My little, helpless baby!

A Tulip Garden

“Guarded within the old red wall's embrace,
Marshalled like soldiers in gay company,
The tulips stand arrayed.  Here infantry
Wheels out into the sunlight.  What bold grace
Sets off their tunics, white with crimson lace!
Here are platoons of gold-frocked cavalry,
With scarlet sabres tossing in the eye
Of purple batteries, every gun in place.
Forward they come, with flaunting colours spread,
With torches burning, stepping out in time
To some quick, unheard march.  Our ears are dead,
We cannot catch the tune.  In pantomime
Parades that army.  With our utmost powers
We hear the wind stream through a bed of flowers.”

             from Sword Blades and Poppy Seed, 1914