The Crocus

The winter night is round me like a skull,

Hollow and black, and time has rotted off;

The sky is void, the starry creeds are null,

And death is at the throat in a soft cough.

And rooted in the leaf-mould of the brain,

I see the crocus burn, sudden as spring,

Yet not of seasons, not of sun or rain,

Bright as a ghost in the skull's scaffolding.

It is not hope, this flower, nor love its light.

It makes the darkness glow, the silence chime;

Its life gives sense to death, names black with white-

The timeless flame that is the wick of time.