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TORTOISES
Grim, gruesome gallantry, to which he is doomed.
Dragged out of an eternity of silent isolation
And doomed to partiality, partial being,
Ache, and want of being,
Want,
Self-exposure, hard humiliation, need to add him-
self on to her.
Born to walk alone,
Forerunner,
Now suddenly distracted into this mazy side-
track,
This awkward, harrowing pursuit,
This grim necessity from within.
Does she know
As she moves eternally slowly away?
Or is he driven against her with a bang, like a bird
flying in the dark against a window,
All knowledgeless?
The awful concussion,
And the still more awful need to persist, to follow,
follow, continue,
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