Piano

SOFTLY, in the dusk, a woman is singing to me;

Taking me back down the vista of years, till I see

A child sitting under the piano, in the boom of the tingling strings

And pressing the small, poised feet of a mother who smiles as she sings.

In spite of myself, the insidious mastry of song

Betrays me back, till the heart of me weeps to belong

To the old Sunday evenings at home, with winter outside

And hymns in the cozy parlor, the tinkling piano our guide.

So now it is vain for the singer to burst into clamor

With the great black piano apassionato. The glamor

Of childhood days is upon me, my manhood is cast

Down in the flood of remembrance, I weep like a child for the past.

D.H. Lawrence

Giorno dei Morti

ALONG the avenue of cypresses,

All in their scarlet cloaks and surplices

Of linen, go the chanting choristers,

The priests in gold and black, the villagers. . .

And all along the path to the cemetery

The round dark heads of men crowd silently,

And black-scarved faces of womenfolk, wistfully

Watch at the banner of death, and the mystery.

And at the foot of a grave a father stands

With sunken head, and forgotten, folded hands;

And at the foot of a grave a mother kneels

With pale shut face, nor either hears nor feels

The coming of the chanting choristers

Between the avenue of cypresses,

The silence of the many villagers,

The candle-flames beside the surplices.

D.H. Lawrence

Gloire de Dijon

WHEN she rises in the morning

I linger to watch her;

She spreads the bath-cloth underneath the window

And the sunbeams catch her

Glistening white on the shoulders,

While down her sides the mellow

Golden shadow glows as

She stoops to the sponge, and her swung breasts

Sway like full-blown

Gloire de Dijon roses.

She drips herself with water, and her shoulders

Glisten as silver; they crumble up

Like wet and falling roses, and I listen

For the sluicing of their rain-dishevelled petals.

In the window full of sunlight

Concentrates her golden shadow

Fold on fold, until it glows as

Mellow as the glory roses.

D. H. Lawrence