About the bed; the sound Of tiny shrieks of pain; Of midnight murders round; Of creatures serpent-slain. A moan of thunder fills The stagnant air; and soon A black cloud from the hills Devours the helpless moon. Those faces stampt in air When all the hateful night We toss, and cannot bear The heated bed, and night Is full of silent sounds That walk about the bed (The whining night-fly wounds The ear; the air is dead; The darkness madness; heat A hell): appear and gaze; Are silent; at the feet Stand gazing; going gaze. * * * * * VI * * * * * DEATH I The Sun said, ‘I have trod The hateful Darkness dead, And the hand of approving God Is placed upon my head.’ And cried, ‘Where art thou, Night? Come forth, thou Worm; appear, That I may slay thee quite.’ And the Night answered, ‘Here.’ And the Sun said, ‘My might Is next to His, Most High; Canst thou destroy me, Night?’ And the Night answered, ‘Aye.’ II This moonèd Desert round, Those deeps before me spread, I sought for Hope, and found Him beautiful, but dead. In this resounding Waste I sought for Hope, and cried, ‘Where art thou, Hope?’—Aghast, I found that he had died. I cried for Hope. The Briars Pointed the way he’d gone; Cold were the Heav’nly Fires, Colder the numb-lipped Moon. ‘Where art thou, Hope?’—‘I go, Returning,’ he had said; I found him white as snow And beautiful, but dead. He would return, he said. When that I heeded not, Lo, he had fallen dead. Dead; Hope is dead; is not. I tear my hands with briars, My face in earth I thrust; I curse the heav’nly fires, I drink the desert dust. A threat of thunder fills Us. Lo, a voice! The waves A breathless horror stills; The sand, a sea of graves. Methought the mocking Moon Open’d her yellow lips And spake. The Planets swoon In vapoury eclipse. ‘Fool, all the world is dust; Even I who shine on thee. There perish and add thy dust To that sepulchral sea.’ III In exile here I trod And with presumptuous breath Call’d out aloud for God: The Answer came from Death. O World, thy quest is cold; O World, who answereth? Distracted thou hast call’d; The Answer came from Death. I call’d for God and heard No voice but that of Death: Then came the bitter word, ‘Fool, God himself is Death. Great Death; not little death That nips the flowers unfurl’d And stays the infant’s breath; But Death that slays the world.