 | Sonnets of the Wingless Hours |  |
68
IN THE WOOD OF DEAD SEA FRUIT.
I lay beneath the trees of Dead Sea Fruit,
Whose every leaf records a life's mistake;
And pored with eyes eternally awake
Upon the bitter waters at their root;
Whose every leaf records a life's mistake;
And pored with eyes eternally awake
Upon the bitter waters at their root;
Searching dead chances; letting If's eyes shoot
Through depths that profitable thoughts forsake
As birds forsake Avernus, when the lake
Yields its old fumes, that numb both man and brute.
Through depths that profitable thoughts forsake
As birds forsake Avernus, when the lake
Yields its old fumes, that numb both man and brute.
This is the pool which mirrors him who bends
Over its stillness, such as once he was,
Not such as now he is, in face and eyes:
Over its stillness, such as once he was,
Not such as now he is, in face and eyes:
Its depths are strewn with all that youth misspends;
With all the wasted chances that life has;
And there all Ophir, all Golconda, lies.
With all the wasted chances that life has;
And there all Ophir, all Golconda, lies.
| Sonnets of the Wingless Hours | |