Nothing was remembered, nothing forgotten. <br />When we awoke, wagons were passing on the warm summer pavements, <br />The window-sills were wet from rain in the night, <br />Birds scattered and settled over chimneypots <br />As among grotesque trees. <br /> <br />Nothing was accepted, nothing looked beyond. <br />Slight-voiced bells separated hour from hour, <br />The afternoon sifted coolness <br />And people drew together in streets becoming deserted. <br />There was a moon, and light in a shop-front, <br />And dusk falling like precipitous water. <br /> <br />Hand clasped hand <br />Forehead still bowed to forehead-- <br />Nothing was lost, nothing possessed <br />There was no gift nor denial. <br /> <br />2 <br />I have remembered you. <br />You were not the town visited once, <br />Nor the road falling behind running feet. <br /> <br />You were as awkward as flesh <br />And lighter than frost or ashes. <br /> <br />You were the rind, <br />And the white-juiced apple, <br />The song, and the words waiting for music. <br /> <br />3 <br />You have learned the beginning; <br />Go from mine to the other. <br /> <br />Be together; eat, dance, despair, <br />Sleep, be threatened, endure. <br />You will know the way of that. <br /> <br />But at the end, be insolent; <br />Be absurd--strike the thing short off; <br />Be mad--only do not let talk <br />Wear the bloom from silence. <br /> <br />And go away without fire or lantern <br />Let there be some uncertainty about your departure.<br /><br />Louise Bogan<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/words-for-departure/
