You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles
YUMPU automatically turns print PDFs into web optimized ePapers that Google loves.
—<br />
INTRODUCTORY MEMOIR<br />
How, like a sad thought huried in light [woven] words,<br />
Winter, an alien presence, is ambushed here.<br />
See from the fire-fountained noon there creep<br />
Lazy vellow ardours towards pale evening,<br />
Dragging the sun across the shell of thought ;<br />
A web threaded with fading fire ;<br />
Futile and fragile lure, a July ghost<br />
Standing with feet of fire on banks of ice,<br />
My frozen heart, the summer cannot reach<br />
Hidden as a root from air, or star from day,<br />
A frozen pool whereon mirth dances,<br />
Where the shining boys would fish.<br />
To Edward Marsh (1914).<br />
" I believe that all poets who are personal see<br />
things genuinely—have their place. One needn't<br />
be a Shakespeare and yet be quite as interesting.<br />
I have moods when Rossetti satisfies me more than<br />
Shakespeare, and I am sure I have enjoyed some<br />
things of Francis Thompson more than the best of<br />
Shakespeare. Yet I never meant to go as high as<br />
these. I know I've come across things <strong>by</strong> people<br />
of far inferior vision that were as important in<br />
their results to me.<br />
I am not going to refute your<br />
criticisms; in literature I have no judgment, at<br />
least for style. If in reading a thought has expressed<br />
itself to me in beautiful words, my<br />
ignorance of grammar, etc., makes me accept that.<br />
21
Change language