The Winged Beetle

ROSA DECIDUA 131 This is no tragedy of little tears. My brain is hard and cold ; there is no beat Of its blood ; there is no heat Of sacred fire upon my lips to sing. My heart is dead ; I say that name thrice over ; Rose !—Rose !—Rose !— Even as lover should call to lover ; There is no quickening, No flood, no fount that flows ; No water wells from the dead spring. My thoughts come singly, dry, contemptuous, Too cold for hate : all I can say is that they come From some dead sphere without me ; Singly they come, beats of a senseless drum Jarred by a fool, harsh, unharmonious. There is no sense within me or about me ; Yet each thought is most surely known For a catastrophe. No climax of a well-wrought tragedy ! Single and sterile. I am here for naught. I have no memory of the rose-red hours. No fragrance of those days amid the flowers Lingers ; all’s drowned in the accursed stench Of this damned present. The past years abort And this is found. Foul waters drench My earth. All’s filth. With what cold eye one scans This body that was—so long since—two years ! I wrench