Classic and Contemporary Poetry
RED PEARLS, by AGNES LEE Poet's Biography First Line: That you should be here! Who could ever guess! Last Line: For they must cling about your neck forever. Alternate Author Name(s): Freer, Otto, Mrs. Subject(s): Pearls | ||||||||
FIRST VOICE That you should be here! Who could ever guess! SECOND VOICE Then you remember me, Columbia? FIRST VOICE Yes -- Our friendship, long ago, beside the sea! But tell me, by what sudden conjury Do you appear before me like a flame, You, from the land of war? SECOND VOICE Your message came. FIRST VOICE Mine? SECOND VOICE Yours. It reached me in a bit of shell. FIRST VOICE I sent no message. SECOND VOICE I recall it well. Come look upon my pearls is what it said. FIRST VOICE Strange! When I clasped them on to-night, they shed Such a soft lustre over me that I Down in my deepest heart said mistily: "If he might see them, see them perfect, white, And know me beautiful! Oh, if he might!" SECOND VOICE And I have come. And you are beautiful. FIRST VOICE See my long rope of pearls, delight as cool As after-kisses of wild fluttering wings! You -- man of space -- who seem to know all things, Do you, then, know its story? SECOND VOICE Yes, I know. FIRST VOICE How it is but my own elation's glow? How fortune upon fortune comes to me? SECOND VOICE I know. And they are beautiful to see! Pearls! Pearls! And how they shimmer, gem on gem! Now let me have a closer look at them: This round perfection is a shattered jaw, And this a mangled brain. Two eyes that saw Are these two pearls, the eyes of one I brothered, Now living in eternal darkness smothered. This was a forehead. These were powerful forms, These, sturdy limbs. And this, that glows and warms, This is the bright supremacy of pain. A noble story, -- gold and gold again For blood and blood and blood! FIRST VOICE I cannot listen! SECOND VOICE These three that with your breathing glance and glisten, These are three tortured women. FIRST VOICE Hush, O hush! SECOND VOICE But look, they change, they seem to overflush. FIRST VOICE My pearls! My lovely pearls! They are turning red! They weigh, they press! I snatch at stinging lead! SECOND VOICE Snatch, -- but they will not move. FIRST VOICE What awful ban, What spell, is on my fingers? Help, help, man, -- O take them off! SECOND VOICE I cannot. FIRST VOICE Help! SECOND VOICE The dawn Is breaking in your house. The guests are gone. And the last servant sleeps with sodden ears. FIRST VOICE Help, some one, help me! SECOND VOICE Call, -- but no one hears. FIRST VOICE Ah, man or ghost, they are fire on fire! They bite! Have pity, -- tear them off! SECOND VOICE Not any might May lift them, neither ghost's nor man's endeavour. For they must cling about your neck forever. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE LOAD OF PEARLS by WILLIAM HENRY DAVIES THE WONDROUS PEARL by OLIVER MURRAY EDWARDS A MOTHER'S SONG by FRANCIS LEDWIDGE THE PEARL DIVER by ANDREW BARTON PATERSON A CHAINE OF PEARLE: THE FIRST PEARLE. RELIGION by DIANA PRIMROSE |
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