Orchids :: :: University of Virginia Library

Four papered walls that once perhaps were white
In some dark backward and abysm of time,
Where rubbed-out flowers indefinitely climb
Towards a cobwebbed ceiling black as night;
A tipsy table shaking in affright
Beneath its load of blotted prose and rhyme,
And then the small cracked window dim with grime
That lets in draughts more easily than light;
The mournful ghosts of two unhappy chairs,
And O a lamp that infinitely smells!
This, with a tenor-singer's daylong yells
And noisy footsteps on the creaking stairs,
This, high among the chimneys and the dome
Of London's fogs and rain-clouds—this is home!

II
IN THE BAR

A hand that twists the broidered veil
Above the drooping flower-red mouth
Upon the straight and delicate nose,
And, gloveless, one, snow-white and frail,
Whereon a glittering emerald glows
That lifts a tumbler to your mouth:

Soft eyes that throw a languid glance
Across the golden blazing bar,
And leave a weary smile with me:
Ah, who can tell the ways of chance,
Or why to-night divided we
Exchange bored smiles across the bar?

But age who sits beside you knows
His worth, and by the right of gold
Is claimant of your charms to-night;
While youth takes up a distant pose
And watches you from far in flight
Before the majesty of gold.

Clatter and babbling voices, and
Cabs rattling by the open door:
Most commonplace, but even here
Despair can sere and hate can brand,
Now when you rise and disappear
Beside your partner through the door!

III
AT THE EMPIRE

The low and soft luxurious promenade,
Electric-light, pile-carpet, the device
Of gilded mirrors that repeat you thrice;
The crowd that lounges, strolls from yard to yard;

The calm and brilliant Circes who retard
Your passage with the skirts and rouge that spice
The changeless programme of insipid vice,
And stun you with a languid strange regard;

Ah! what are these, the perfume and the glow,
The ballet that coruscates down below,
The glittering songstress and the comic stars,

Ah! what are these, although we sit withdrawn
Above our sparkling tumblers and cigars,
To us so like to perish with a yawn?

IV
UNE PASSADE

Night's hours ticked slowly by, and made
A tune to our delight,
Till when the dark went nigh to fade
We went into the night;

And in the silence watched aflower
Far in the East withdrawn
The faint blue light of that long hour
That goes before the dawn.

So in the darkness standing we
Parted to live and die.
None knows the love that grew to be
Between us, you and I.

None knows: and you and I forget—
The world is full of din.
Only in God's book lingers yet
The record of our sin.