«This, not graveyard roses, is my gift; / And I won’t burn sticks of incense: / You died as unflinchingly as you lived, / With magnificent defiance. / Drank wine, and joked — were still the wittiest, / Choked on the stifling air. / You yourself let in the terrible guest And stayed al...»
«After plodding year after year / through towns in an alien land, / we have ground enough to despair — / and despair is where we must end. For despair is our final refuge — / as if, midwinter, we had come / from Vespers in a nearby church, / through Russian snow, to our home.»
«Bring visions when you ring my bell / or all the loveliness of hell, / of God, if you belong to that band. / But little acts of meaning well — / just leave them outside on the hat stand. On this small pea in endless space / be shining angel or be demon. / But not mere man, though, for...»
«Through the closed nursery doors, the sugar angel / stares through the chink to see / the children playing at the Christmas party, / the brightly candled tree. Nana is making up the crackling fire, / a blaze for Christmas Day. / Only the sugar angel — he is German — / wastes, warm a...»