For I shall feel the rush of streets
Shooting inquisitive fingers into chaos,
Piercing the night's remote divinity.
And I shall never rid me of these scars
That time and man have cut into my thought,
Never shake off my shoulders
The burden of the city's pain.
Oh, never shall we escape thee,
Mother of mutiny and want,
Thou beautiful mistress of Grief . . .
Oh, never shall we escape thy insomnial nights
Beating with ineloquent hands
The tambourines of time,
The drums of war;
Fevering our minds
With the swollen traffic of thoughts,
The wheels and rattle of an endless search. . . .
Shooting inquisitive fingers into chaos,
Piercing the night's remote divinity.
And I shall never rid me of these scars
That time and man have cut into my thought,
Never shake off my shoulders
The burden of the city's pain.
Oh, never shall we escape thee,
Mother of mutiny and want,
Thou beautiful mistress of Grief . . .
Oh, never shall we escape thy insomnial nights
Beating with ineloquent hands
The tambourines of time,
The drums of war;
Fevering our minds
With the swollen traffic of thoughts,
The wheels and rattle of an endless search. . . .
Tired I am with wandering,
Pricked with the lights and jostled by the worlds,
More jaded than the Moon, more hopeless, grey,
Than that sad pilgrim lost amid the stars! . . .
Pricked with the lights and jostled by the worlds,
More jaded than the Moon, more hopeless, grey,
Than that sad pilgrim lost amid the stars! . . .
1918
112
