Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE AMAZON, by JOHN FREEMAN


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE AMAZON, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Now in the brake the burning footprints / stare
Last Line: In one white shroud?
Subject(s): Amazons; Nature


NOW in the brake the burning footprints stare
Tawny and hollow where
Autumn fled furiously bright, her hands and feet
Quickened with drunken heat.
High elms are yellow washed, berries are red,
Swaying in brief motion overhead;
And one Ash, young and comely, still unraped
Of a single bough, is draped
One side with a bloody flag of light, and one
A bronze shield hangs upon.
She seems an Amazon in warrior guise,
Leaf-helmed, with shielded eyes,
Thin supple bosom, steady shoulders, hair
Bickering in the air.

Out of the cloud what sudden spear has gashed
Her side, what javelin flashed
Under her guard? The blood falls, the boughs droop—
Ah, shall her courage stoop?
Must even this Amazon bend soon to Winter,
Her clutching fingers splinter,
Her shield be torn away—a skeleton
Bare to the bone
Be all of her, for the winds to wrangle in
And shuddering whine and spin
Away? And shall the ghostly snows yet fill
Her eye-sockets, and spill
Upon arms and thighs and knees, till she is bowed
In one white shroud?





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