We are closed in, fouled by the numbness of this concentration cell.
The honeybees on the upper wall know well enough
That the man below have been crossed by the stars
Turned on their uncertainty: they are lost
Treading upon the phantasy of their hearts,
They should have been men.
Outside the rage momently undoes
What were patterns of human hope and love.
In the sharp history of man, with his back turned
upon the sensuousness of the sea,
And neck craning on to some usable good
Every phase were glad of its own death
Had it felt that keeping to their own past intent
Were sons whom it bore-
Holding out hopes of more mature dispensations.
The golden Sun, the wings of this, the wisp of grass which
Grown miraculously somewhere in the waste
Is at peace with its life and our mockery;
The river bickering down with its sudden waters of death;
Too late to be saved-
As the love of Nature that is forsworn:
And the men who have played their parts to build
And were out witted by- genius, love, common mistake
Or natural declension of the soul
To full down what thcy created;
All the flavour stays in the Sun
And moves forward on the fatal flood of times
Like parables that improve as they are recounted.