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Aren't there bigger things to talk about Than a window in Greenwich Village And hyacinths sprouting Like little puce poems out of a sick soul? Some cosmic hearsay— As to whom—it can't be Mars! put the moon—that way.... Or what winds do to canyons Under the tall stars... Or even How that old roué, Neptune, Cranes over his bald-head moons At the twinkling heel of a sky-scraper.
This poem is in the public domain.
Wind rising in the alleys
My spirit lifts in you like a banner
Streaming free of hot walls.
You are full of unspent dreams . . .
You are laden with beginnings . . .
Come forth, you workers!
Let the fires go cold—
Let the iron spill out, out of the troughs—
Let the iron run wild
Like a red bramble on the floors—
Leave the mill and the foundry and the mine
And the shrapnel lying on the wharves—
Leave the desk and the shuttle and the loom—
I have known only my own shallows—
Safe, plumbed places,
Where I was wont to preen myself.
But for the abyss
I wanted a plank beneath
And horizons...
I was afraid of the silence
And the slipping toe-hold...