ISSUE: Autumn 1930
There is a salt-marsh far away,
Perilous and deep,
The heavy oakwoods lean above,
Blue herons walk in sleep
Around the ponds of indigo
As herons walked ages ago.
Not all the wings of all the birds
Could wake that place to sound,
The bees upon the rosemary
Hang golden, drunk, and drowned,
In the air there stirs no breath,
The birches stand as white as death.
The dark ponds have an evil depth
As fathomless as sky.
Though sleep has bent the sedges down,
Some very, open eye
Is watching hot and steady there
Like a spider in its snare.
