 | Dirge for Aoine and other poems |  |
xv
WEED-FIRES
Now every little garden holds a haze
That tells of longer nights and shorter days:
Handfuls of weeds and outcast garden-folk
Yield up their lives and pass away in smoke.
The leaves of dandelions, deeply notched,
Burn with the thistle's purple plumes, unwatched
Of any eyes that loved them yesterday,
And flare in sullen fumes, and pass away.
That tells of longer nights and shorter days:
Handfuls of weeds and outcast garden-folk
Yield up their lives and pass away in smoke.
The leaves of dandelions, deeply notched,
Burn with the thistle's purple plumes, unwatched
Of any eyes that loved them yesterday,
And flare in sullen fumes, and pass away.
The small fires whimper softly as they burn;
They murmur at the hand that will not turn
Back on the dial and bring to them again
June's turquoise skies or April's diamond rain.
“Alas,” the weeds are crying as they smoulder,
“We are grown wiser with our growing older;
We know what summer is—but ah! we buy
Knowledge too dear; we know because we die.”
They murmur at the hand that will not turn
Back on the dial and bring to them again
June's turquoise skies or April's diamond rain.
“Alas,” the weeds are crying as they smoulder,
“We are grown wiser with our growing older;
We know what summer is—but ah! we buy
Knowledge too dear; we know because we die.”
| Dirge for Aoine and other poems | |