(no subject)

[sophiawestern]

I walk down the garden-paths,
And all the daffodils
And blowing, and the bright blue squill.
I walk down the patterned garden-paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
With my powdered hair and jewelled fan,
I too am a rare
Pattern. As I wander down
The garden-paths.
My dress is richly figured,
And the train
Makes a pink and sliver stain
On the gravel, and the thrift
Of the borders.
Just a plate of current fashion,
Tripping by in high-helled, ribboned shoes.
Not a softness anywhere about me,
Only whale-bone and brocade.
And I sink on a seat in the shade
Of a lime-tree. For my pattion
Wars against the stiff brocade,
The daffodils and squill
Flutter in the breeze
As they please.
And I weep;
For the lime-tree is in blossom
And on small flower had dropped upon my bosom.
And the plashing of the waterdrops
In the marble fountain
Come down the garden-paths.
The dripping never stops.
Underneath my stiffened gown
Is the softness of a woman bathing in a marble basin,
A basin in the midst of hedges grown
So think, she cannot see her lover hiding,
But she guesses he is near,
And the sliding of the water
Seens the stroke of a dear
Hand upon her.
What is Summer in a fine brocaded gown!
I should like to see it lying in a heap upon the ground.
All the pink and silver crumpled up on the ground.


I would be the pink and silver as I ran along the paths,
And he would stumbe after
Bewildered by my laughter.
I should see the sun flashing from his sword hilt and the buckles on his shoes.
I would choose
To lead him in a maz along the pattterned paths,
A bright and laughing maze for my heavy-booted lover,
Till he caught me in the shade,
And the buttons of his waistcoat buised my body as he clasped me,
Aching, meliting unafraid,
With the shadows of the leaves and sundrops,
And the plopping of the waterdrops,
All about us in the open afternoon--
I am very like to swoon
With the weight of this brocade,
For the sun sift throught the shade.
Undernath the fallen blossom
In my bosom,
Is a letter I have hid.
It was brought to me this morning by a rider from the Duke.
"Madam, we regret to inform you that Lord Hartwell
Died in action Thursday se-nnight."
As I read it in the whiter, morning sunlight,
The letters squirmed like snakes.
"Any answer, Madam," Said my footman.
"No," I told him.
"See that the messenger takes some refreshment.
No, no answer."
And I walked into the garden.
Up and down the patternet pathes,
In my stiff, correct brocade.
The blue and yellow flowers stood up proudly in the sun,
Each one.
I stood upright too,
Held rigid to the pattern
By the stiffness of my gown.
Up and down I walked,
Up and down.

In a month he would have been my husband.
In a month, here, underneath this oim,
We would have broke the patter;
He for me, and I for him,
He as Colonel, I as Lady,
On this shady seat,
He had a whim
That sunlight carried blessing.
And I answeres, "It shall e as you have said."
Now he is dead.

In Summer and in Winter I shall walk
Up and down
The patterned garden-paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
The squills and daffodils
Will give place to pillared roses, and to asters, and to snow.
I shall go
Up and down,.
In my gown.
Gorgeously arrayed,
Boned and stayed.
And the softness of my body will be guarded from embrace
By each button, hook, and lace.
For the man who should loose me is dead,
Fights with the Duke in Flanders,
In a pattern called a war.
Christ! What are patterns for?

- Amy Lowell