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[The city breaks in houses to the sea, uneasy with waves,]

1894 –

1976

The city breaks in houses to the sea, uneasy with waves,
And the lonely sun clashes like brass cymbals.

In the streets truck-horses, muscles sliding under the steaming hides,
Pound the sparks flying about their hooves;
And fires, those gorgeous beasts, squirm in the furnaces,
Under the looms weaving us.

At evening by cellars cold with air of rivers at night,
We, whose lives are only a few words,
Watch the young moon leaning over the baby at her breast
And the stars small to our littleness.

The slender trees stand alone in the fields
Between the roofs of the far town
And the wood far away like a low hill.

In the vast open
The birds are faintly overheard.

This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on May 8, 2022, by the Academy of American Poets.

Born in 1894, in Brooklyn, New York, Charles Reznikoff was the author of several poetry collections and was a principal proponent of Objectivism.

About Charles Reznikoff

Themes

About this Poem

“[The city breaks in houses to the sea, uneasy with waves,]” appeared in Poems (Samuel Roth at the New York Poetry Book Shop, 1920).

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More by this poet

Rhythms (Section I)

The stars are hidden,
the lights are out;
the tall black houses
are ranked about.

I beat my fists
on the stout doors,
no answering steps
come down the floors.

Charles Reznikoff

1927

It had been long dark, though still an hour before supper-time.

It had been long dark, though still an hour before supper-time.
The boy stood at the window behind the curtain.
The street under the black sky was bluish white with snow.
Across the street, where the lot sloped to the pavement,
boys and girls were going down on sleds.
The boys were after him because he was a Jew.
 
At last his father and mother slept. He got up and dressed.
In the hall he took out his sled and went out on tiptoe.
No one was in the street. The slide was worn smooth and slippery--just right.
He laid himself down on his sled and shot away.

Charles Reznikoff

1927

Beggar Woman

When I was four years old my mother led me to the park.
The spring sunshine was not too warm. The street was almost empty.
The witch in my fairy-book came walking along.
She stooped to fish some mouldy grapes out of the gutter.

Charles Reznikoff

1921

Poems

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[The city breaks in houses to the sea, uneasy with waves,]

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