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Robert Laurence Binyon - Deptford
Work rating: Low

Well is it, shrouded Sun, thou spar`st no ray
 To illumine this sad street! A light more bare
 Would but discover more this bald array
 Of roofs dejected, window patched that stare
 From sordid walls: for the shy breath of Spring,
 Her cheek of flowers, or fragrance of her hair,
 Thou could`st not, save to cheated memory, bring.

 Alas! I welcome this dull mist, that drapes
 The path of the heavy sky above the street,
 Casting a phantom dimness on these shapes
 That pass, by toil disfeatured, with slow feet
 And with mistrustful eyes; though in the mud
 Children the play of ages old repeat,
 Because of quenchless wanting in their blood.

 Yet oh, what clouds of heaviness deter
 My spirit; what sad vacancy impedes!
 I am like some far--ventured traveller,
 Whom, in a forest vast, entangled weeds
 Have hindered; over whom green darkness fills
 The inextricable boughs and stifling feeds
 A poisonous fear, that sinks on him and chills.

 Nor finds he faith, amid the monstrous trees
 Rooted in silence, peopled with strange cries
 And stealthy shadows (where alone he sees
 Rank growths of the hot marsh, but watching eyes
 Imagines), to believe the self--same bark
 He leans on, lifts to the unclouded skies
 Its crest victorious from that cradle dark.

 I with like pain and languor am opprest:
 Me too a forest upon poison fed,
 Me too the marsh and the rank weeds infest.
 Almost I trace in the dumb pall o`erhead
 A net of stubborn boughs that dimly mesh
 The air; I stifle: like a chain of lead
 They weigh upon my soul, they bind my flesh.

 I cannot breathe: the last and worst despair
 Begins to invade me, numbing even desire
 That panted for sweet draughts of light and air.
 Dumb walls against me with blind heaven conspire:
 Incredible the sun seems now, a ghost
 I dreamed of in my dreams; unreal fire.
 The light is blotted out, the blue is lost.

 Was it mirage, the glow I fancied warm
 On human cheeks, the beauty of my kind?
 I feel it fading from me, a brief charm
 Flying at touch. Blow hither, storms of wind!
 Strike hither, strong sun, to my dulled heart`s core!
 Awake, disturb me, lest mine eyes grow blind,
 By fatal use to a foul dream resigned,
 Accept for Nature`s body this, her sore.
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