All Poems
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Silver Filigree
© Elinor Wylie
The icicles wreathing
On trees in festoon
Swing, swayed to our breathing:
They're made of the moon.
Sea Lullaby
© Elinor Wylie
The old moon is tarnished
With smoke of the flood,
The dead leaves are varnished
With colour like blood.
Sanctuary
© Elinor Wylie
This is the bricklayer; hear the thud
Of his heavy load dumped down on stone.
His lustrous bricks are brighter than blood,
His smoking mortar whiter than bone.
Quarrel
© Elinor Wylie
Let us quarrel for these reasons:
You detest the salt which seasons
My speech . . . and all my lights go out
In the cold poison of your doubt.
Prophecy
© Elinor Wylie
I shall die hidden in a hut
In the middle of an alder wood,
With the back door blind and bolted shut,
And the front door locked for good.
Primavera in the North
© Elinor Wylie
She has danced for leagues and leagues,
Over thorns and thistles,
Prancing to a tune of Griegg's
Performed on willow whistles.
Pretty Words
© Elinor Wylie
I love bright words, words up and singing early;
Words that are luminous in the dark, and sing;
Warm lazy words, white cattle under trees;
I love words opalescent, cool, and pearly,
Like midsummer moths, and honied words like bees,
Gilded and sticky, with a little sting.
Poor Earth
© Elinor Wylie
It is not heaven: bitter seed
Leavens its entrails with despair
It is a star where dragons breed:
Devils have a footing there.
Phases of the Moon
© Elinor Wylie
Once upon a time I heard
That the flying moon was a Phoenix bird;
Thus she sails through windy skies,
Thus in the willow's arms she lies;
Ophelia
© Elinor Wylie
My locks are shorn for sorrow
Of love which may not be;
Tomorrow and tomorrow
Are plotting cruelty.
October
© Elinor Wylie
Beauty has a tarnished dress,
And a patchwork cloak of cloth
Dipped deep in mournfulness,
Striped like a moth.
Now let no charitable hope
© Elinor Wylie
Now let no charitable hope
Confuse my mind with images
Of eagle and of antelope:
I am by nature none of these.
Come, My Little Children, Hear Are Songs For You
© Robert Louis Stevenson
COME, my little children, here are songs for you;
Some are short and some are long, and all, all are new.
You must learn to sing them very small and clear,
Very true to time and tune and pleasing to the ear.
Nancy
© Elinor Wylie
If you are flame, it dances and burns blue;
If you are light, it pierces like a star
Intenser than a needlepoint of ice.
The dextrous touch that shaped the soul of you,
Mingled, to mix, and make you what you are,
Magic between the sugar and the spice.
Nadir
© Elinor Wylie
Let us at least pretend--it may be true--
That we can close our lips on poisonous
Dark wine diluted by the Stygean wave;
And let me dream sublimity in you,
And courage, liberal for the two of us:
Let us at least pretend we can be brave.
Madman's Song
© Elinor Wylie
Better to see your cheek grown hollow,
Better to see your temple worn,
Than to forget to follow, follow,
After the sound of a silver horn.
Love Song
© Elinor Wylie
Lovers eminent in love
Ever diversities combine;
The vocal chords of the cushat-dove,
The snake's articulated spine.
Little Joke
© Elinor Wylie
Stripping an almond tree in flower
The wise apothecary's skill
A single drop of lethal power
From perfect sweetness can distill
Les Lauriers Sont Coupée
© Elinor Wylie
Ah, love, for other brows they are cut down.
Thornless and scentless are their stems and flowers,
And cold as death their twisted coronal.
Sweeter to us the sharpness of this crown;
Sweeter the wildest roses which are ours;
Sweeter the petals, even when they fall.
