Harold Acton

“ As lidless eyes for crows to peck at them.
And in the sloe-gin heat of summer days
The sky’s enamel is not quite Limoges
But almost; here and there a tiny scratch
Of soaring bird, some swallow on the wing
Does irritate the surface. Sheer below,
Fierce-biting on the edges, rise the trees;
Their taper-blossoms opulently lit
As girandoles that smoulder silently
Blue dust of incense; kohl-eyed evening
Sponges the face with dripping fragrances.
The vines and olives terraced on the hills
Melt on the dean horizon blurringly,
Where clouds descend in deluge, liquid-gold. ”

“ The mountains lost their foreheads in the clouds;
The saffron-wingèd manticor of day, [34]
As constellations glimmered from their shrouds,
Had taken sudden fear and flown away.
On fallen blossoms stretched
Beneath ten mango groves
One Titan slept and snored
With nostrils wide as stoves.
Caparisoned in trappings massy gold,
Six Titanesses, heaped on mammoths, ride,
That grunt beneath their weight until they scold
And lacerate each fibrous, knotted hide.
The mountains tremble now,
And cedars spin like tops,
The satyrs hide in caves
Until the thudding stops. ”

“ The fields of France will run in little rivers of their blood
And a few, all gashed and gory, will be sprawling in the mud.
Some are going to a land of death, and never to arise,
Some are going to their funerals; I roll with bloodshot eyes—
Boum, boum—boum, boum, boum.
[31]
And their lithe and youthful bodies will be broken mannequins
That the Doctors will be cutting, and the bandages and pins
Will take the place of cockroaches and rats with pinkish eyes
And the lice that suck the blood of every soldier ere he dies. ”

“ Shropshire, you know, with clouds of down,
This is a change from the gaping sheep
Grazing for ever, half asleep.
I have just come from the country wealds,
Shropshire, you know, with spinach fields,
Men there are honest and plump and red,
Here they are sallow for lack of bread.
But in the office the clock ticks fast
Telling how soon the hours flit past,
Middle-aged drudges the hour-long day
Hammer their pallid lives away. ”

“ White arms, mouths of carmine, ankles so slender
You might fear that they would snap candy-wise.
In the nebular effects of cigarette smoke,
Through the various hemispheres the eye turns,
One of us is breathing out rhythms
For the gratification of an audience.
Animated in the hum of conversation,
We achieve miracles.
When the veneer is shed and the heart lain bare
We turn men’s thoughts to Heaven or to Hell—
Cathedral Altar or the Brothel couch. ”

“ The rustling of the clouds was pearling grey and silver by,
The lady of the clouds had dropped her muff, but on she trailed,
Her dainty gown was powder-blue, her train was dragon-tailed.
Her face was pale as curds and whey with sleepy-starey look,
The stars they must have bored her, for they were her only book—
And yet she seemed disdainful as the poplars bowed their plumes,
With all the feudal worship that a cloudy queen assumes.
Oh, why was it the poet glanced with envy in his eye
Above him at the clouds a-sailing grey and silver by?
[41] Escape (Rêvons: c’est l’heure—Verlaine) ”

“ A labyrinth of azure-rifted clouds.
Where saffron-throated birds in whirring crowds
Would weep celestial music with their wings,
And tawny monkeys, tiny nimble things,
Would play their melodramas in the trees,
And throbbing swarms of honey-sucking bees
Vibrate the petalled air in droning waves,
And mingle with the murmuring of slaves. ”

“ Or a Coon’s banana cakewalk
(Come and kiss me, ducky, do!) .
(A vision of red-mouths, outthrust bellies in a leafy
créme-de-menthe tropic.)
Wind Instruments
Trombone
I am the brawny man without a brain
Who yawns a heartfelt music mournfully. ”

“ Of clouds that lust enamoured of the stars,
Shimmering jewelled pinpricks wistfully
Awed by the vastness and the mystery
Wrapped palpitating round. Then fold on fold
The shoulders of the hills are outlined bold
With pallid smoothness, undulating far
To where the empty, trackless deserts are.
[51] Part II
URBANITIES
[52]
[53] Sabbath Morning Rain
LIKE diamond on window pane,
The sky is jagged by spears of rain.
As splashed by layers of grease and lard
The slate-roofs glitter cold and hard.
And people drag their damp-soled feet
Like sacks of dough along the street. ”

“ Fall on my Sunday best.” How like a woman’s kiss
It seemed to slither nudely down his throat.
Glutinous amber. The tea, when milk had flecked it,
Softening the vulgar cairngorm to a mere distinguished
Nebulosity (pompous) , nubiferousness (more pompous still) ,
Was almost worth the drinking, although it lacked
The romance of being specified Chinese. ”