Poems
Stubbs, Madelon & Thayer, Mary Dixon & Hanlon, John & Roche, Loretta & Zabel, Morton & McCormick, Virginia
September 2, 1925 THE COMMONWEAL 397 POEMS My eyes!—God, they burn! Has the dark descended? Has the sun ceased to turn? Has the universe ended? I saw a planet, Flaming and falling. 'Twas...
...JPeitmotif Suddenly, every leaf conceals a swallow That joins a choir which shatters the dusk's thin blue, And one swift thought leaves other thoughts to follow The still unbroken dominance of you...
...Not frail nor fugitive this tawny dust Twinkling on antlered head and brittle wings...
...Ah, now I remember— The flame was a token— The star was ^ your face...
...See the horde That riotously swarms, unsatisfied Till each ambrosial storehouse is explored And every blossom's treasury well pried...
...Twas the flame that began it...
...Ah, catch the shadow that falls Along the meadow-grasses...
...The flame of autumn hills has carried only A prophecy of gray...
...Wise iEsculapian bees, Not merely honey drunken debauchees...
...I am searching even today, when I know so surely That this is a foolish thing for my hands to do— You will not see or know what it is I am making, And never will care...
...On past the bounds of space, Into the pit of hell...
...Loretta Roche...
...Such noisy busybodies...
...My love is a bird that calk— My love a shadow that passes . . . Mary Dixok Thayer...
...to you belong The whispering dusks before our love had ended, The breaking leaves, and swallows mad with song...
...That his sole mission, bumping joyously, Is for the sweetness that the flowers give...
...Bird-Song Do you see that bird in the sky...
...It is my love for you...
...Once I thought I might find a word like a cameo, One that would swing on the end of a carven chain, And once I had words that slipped in and out of a melody, Like children playing hide and seek in a lane...
...Morton Zabel...
...Oh, how far it fell...
...But my searching is all for you...
...There came a stab of fire, Burning my heart— My heart—that was broken, And riven apart...
...It is the vital element that must Make fertile through predestined scatterings My cucumbers...
...Virginia McCormick...
...Vain Seeking I have been searching for words to put in a song, Words without ragged edges, tipped with a clear warm light, Words with the color and softness of ruffled pansies, Scarlet with brown spots—purple and creamy white...
...Lyric I have been young but I have not found living As light as minstrels sing Like dandelions in the meadows, giving The countersign of spring...
...This is the stage of memory, unattended By little griefs and quarrels...
...Like a bird in the dusk, it flies, Like a bird in the dusk, it sings . . . And under the moon it drifts, And over the curving sea, And my love blows with the wind Through gates of mystery...
...My love is like a bird— A bird with shining wings...
...Four ears to hear, within October closes, The cricket symphony...
...Even after the indolent years are over, And all the tentative loves have tried, in vain To break the walls of forgetting, birds can uncover My heart, and bring you walking with me again...
...John Hanlon...
...Madelon Stubbs...
...It takes four eyes to realize that roses Endure eternally...
...Bees Think you this topaz powder on the bee Is accidental, frail or fugitive...
...For I have felt drab April days drag lonely Instead of lilting gay...
...Yet, though the years limp on, the yearning lingers That fate will lead me where Love may break through the blue with rosy fingers And make me see and hear...
...Fetters are galling, But they keep one safe— Were I not held so tightly, I would leap into space...
Vol. 2 • September 1925 • No. 17
