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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
DAUGHTERS OF JOY, by HERBERT TRENCH Poet's Biography First Line: Long, subtle-floating, the choir Last Line: While man knows not of love, and cannot curb his fever. Subject(s): London; Love - Nature Of; Women | |||
I LONG, subtle-floating, the choir Of strings -- soft floods of tone -- In pleading dance-measure, invades Cloud-like the pavement, where With the night wind's vast lament in mine ears, I am walking alone. II You, from the dance yonder? In tears, at this street-corner? "I am going home, my friend. (Strange, that you knew me!) Dances are not for the sore heart, nor lights for the scorner." III How came you to live so, sister? "Jealous was he I cared for -- False, but jealous -- he died -- Flung himself into the river? And then a child . . . no matter! What should the child be spared for? IV "What mattered? What matters in London But the play of the iron mill? It is full of women who smile And heroes live upon them. There, if a love rise in your heart, 'tis that that you must kill. V "Smile under the lamp-glare! To laugh cracks your painting -- There's no place to weep there Or bow the head in silence: Under an archway the clever children mock at a woman fainting. VI "Sick, hie to the almshouse -- Lie in your shroud, thinking! Soiled before you have loved, When you have loved, betrayed; And is there, once betrayed, a better end than drinking? VII "O wiser ones will save -- And then there may be marriage; After precipitous years Settling down (with your past Always to take the opposite seat) in a well-padded carriage!" VIII Through Asia sweeps that voice, Through Christendom and Jewry. Look up at the tavern-door -- See! A phantom peering in, The smile of a daughter of joy on the drawn face of a fury. IX Down the dark tremendous vale Whirling like leaves, O Daughters Of Joy, O gash'd priestesses Night-bound, hectic, marred, Ye that were lovely once as clouds mirrored in waters, X To what dominion dire Flag your fierce wings, till they Glide through the dense realms lit Only by eyes of prey? Whither, O sister-spirits eternal, sink ye away? XI "Back to the Past we sink, Whence the human would be soaring, To deep-pent Chaos back -- Hold out no hand to us -- Rushing disharmonies, lost, lost, past deploring!" XII So the blazing rout shall coil Unnumbered down for ever, And the foul shall breed the foul, And the heavenly heights be far, While man knows not of love, and cannot curb his fever. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ARISTOTLE TO PHYLLIS by JOHN HOLLANDER A WOMAN'S DELUSION by SUSAN HOWE JULIA TUTWILER STATE PRISON FOR WOMEN by ANDREW HUDGINS THE WOMEN ON CYTHAERON by ROBINSON JEFFERS TOMORROW by ANNA LETITIA BARBAULD |
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