This youth too long has heard the break <br />Of waters in a land of change. <br />He goes to see what suns can make <br />From soil more indurate and strange. <br /> <br />He cuts what holds his days together <br />And shuts him in, as lock on lock: <br />The arrowed vane announcing weather, <br />The tripping racket of a clock; <br /> <br />Seeking, I think, a light that waits <br />Still as a lamp upon a shelf, -- <br />A land with hills like rocky gates <br />Where no sea leaps upon itself. <br /> <br />But he will find that nothing dares <br />To be enduring, save where, south <br />Of hidden deserts, torn fire glares <br />On beauty with a rusted mouth, -- <br /> <br />Where something dreadful and another <br />Look quietly upon each other.<br /><br />Louise Bogan<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-tale/
