Beside the harpsichord a lonely
Fir tree sleeps on a cold
Hill of gifts; it holds out branches
Laden with ice and snow.
Beyond it are paintings by Magnasco,
Ensor, Redon.
These are valued at-some value I forget,
Which I learned from a-I cannot remember the source.
Here, from a province of Norway, a grandfather's
Clock with the waist and bust of a small
But unusually well-developed woman
Is
as
if
invented by Chagall.
Floating on the floor,
It
ticks, to no one, interminable proposals.
But, married, I turn into my mother
Is
the motto of all such sun-dials.
The sun, shattering on them,
Says,
Clean, clean, clean;
says,
White, white, white.
The hours of the night
Bend darkly over them; at midnight a maiden
Pops out, says:
Midnight, and all's white.
. The snow-cream my son is dreaming of eating
In the morning, is no whiter than my wife,
And all her lipsticks are like blackberries.
Looking into the cool
Dry
oval of her face-snow tracked with eyes,
Lips, nostrils, the gray grained
Shadow of some sorrow, some repugnance
Conquered once, come back in easy conquest–
I read in it my simple story.
Breakfasting among apple-blossoms, the first fiery
