Interlude

Amid this hot green glowing gloom A word falls with a raindrop's boom... Like baskets of ripe fruit in air The bird-songs seem, suspended where Those goldfinches—the ripe warm lights Peck slyly at them—take quick flights. My feet are feathered like a bird Among the shadows scarcely heard; I bring you branches green with dew And fruits that you may crown anew Your whirring waspish-gilded hair Amid this cornucopia— Until your warm lips bear the stains And bird-blood leap within your veins.

Fireworks

Pink faces—(worlds or flowers or seas or stars),
You all alike are patterned with hot bars

Of coloured light; and falling where I stand,
The sharp and rainbow splinters from the band

Seem fireworks, splinters of the Infinite—
(Glitter of leaves the echoes). And the night

Edith Sitwell

1918

At the Fair

I. Springing Jack

Green wooden leaves clap light away,
Severely practical, as they

Shelter the children candy-pale,
The chestnut-candles flicker, fail . . .

The showman’s face is cubed clear as
The shapes reflected in a glass

Of water—(glog, glut, a ghost’s speech
Fumbling for space from each to each).

The fusty showman fumbles, must
Fit in a particle of dust

The universe, for fear it gain
Its freedom from my cube of brain.

Edith Sitwell

2017

Déjeuner Sur L’Herbe

Green apples dancing in a wash of sun—
Ripples of sense and fun—
A net of light that wavers as it weaves
The sunlight on the chattering leaves;
The half-dazed sound of feet,
And carriages that ripple in the heat.
The parasols like shadows of the sun
Cast wavering shades that run
Across the laughing faces and across
Hair with a bird-bright gloss.
The swinging greenery casts shadows dark,
Hides me that I may mark
How, buzzing in this dazzling mesh, my soul
Seems hardening it to flesh, and one bright whole.

Edith Sitwell

1918

Poems

Interlude

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Fireworks

At the Fair

Déjeuner Sur L’Herbe

Poems

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Interlude

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