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Conrad Potter Aiken - The Things
Work rating: Low

The house in Broad Street, red brick, with nine rooms 
the weedgrown graveyard with its rows of tombs 
the jail from which imprisoned faces grinned 
at stiff palmettos flashing in the wind 


the engine-house, with engines, and a tank 
in which young alligators swam and stank, 
the bell-tower, of red iron, where the bell 
gonged of the fires in a tone from hell 


magnolia trees with whitehot torch of bud 
the yellow river between banks of mud 
the tall striped lighthouse like a barber’s pole 
snake in the bog and locust in the hole 


worn cigarette cards, of white battleships, 
or flags, or chorus girls with scarlet lips, 
jackstones of copper, peach tree in the yard 
splashing ripe peaches on an earth baked hard 


children beneath the arc-light in a romp 
with Run sheep Run, and rice-birds in the swamp, 
the organ-grinder’s monkey, dancing bears, 
okras in baskets, Psyche on the stairs— 


and then the north star nearer, and the snow 
silent between the now and long ago 
time like a train that roared from place to place 
new crowds, new faces, for a single face 


no longer then the chinaberry tree 
nor the dark mockingbird to sing his glee 
nor prawns nor catfish; icicles instead 
and Indian-pipes, and cider in the shed 


arbutus under pinewoods in the spring 
and death remembered as a tropic thing 
with picture postcard angels to upraise it 
and trumpet vines and hummingbirds to phrase it 


then wisdom come, and Shakspere’s voice far off, 
to be or not, upon the teacher’s cough, 
the latent heat of melting ice, the brief 
hypotenuse from ecstasy to grief 


amo amas, and then the cras amet, 
the new-found eyes no slumber could forget, 
Vivien, the affliction of the senses, 
and conjugation of historic tenses 


and Shakspere nearer come, and louder heard, 
and the disparateness of flesh and word, 
time growing swifter, and the pendulums 
in shorter savage arcs that beat like drums— 


hands held, relinquished, faces come and gone, 
kissed and forgotten, and become but one, 
old shoes worn out, and new ones bought, the gloves 
soiled, and so lost in limbo, like the loves— 


then Shakspere in the heart, the instant speech 
parting the conscious terrors each from each— 
wisdom’s dishevelment, the purpose lamed, 
and purposeless the footsteps eastward aimed 


the bloodstream always slower, while the clock 
followed the tired heart with louder knock, 
fatigue upon the eye, the tardy springs 
inviting to no longer longed-for things— 


the birdsong nearer now than Shakspere’s voice, 
whispers of comfort—Death is near, rejoice!— 
remember now the red house with nine rooms 
the graveyard with its trumpetvines and tombs— 


play jackstones now and let your jackstones be 
the stars that make Orion’s galaxy 
so to deceive yourself until you move 
into that house whose tenants do not love.
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