A Group of Verse

I

All day the pavement has been black

With rain, but in our warm brightly-lit

Room, praise God,

I kept saying to myself,

And saying not a word,

Amen, you answered.

u

From my window I could not see the moon,

And yet it was shining:

The yard among the houses-

Snow upon it-

An oblong in the darkness.

ul

Among the heaps of brick and plaster lies

A girder, itself among the rubbish.

Iv

Rooted among roofs, their smoke among the clouds,

Factory chimneys-our cedars of Lebanon.

v

What are you doing in our street among the automobiles,

Horse?

How are your cousins, the centaur and the unicorn?

vI

Of our visitors-I do not know which I dislike most:

The silent beetles or these noisy flies.