So deep I slept I had not known how fleet
The feet of time upon its endless shore;
So sweet was sleep I turned and asked for more,
That, rounded out, the hour might be complete.
But, in a sudden nickering down the street,
Came that which shook all being to the core—
A clear high whinny that the night wind bore,
The wrench of bitten grass, a mare’s light feet.
And there it seemed as though again I heard,
On other nights which frost made white and still,
By Brooklyn hedges where the sound half-blurred,
Upon the metalled road the sudden ring
Of cantering hoofs come over Cartwright’s Hill,
And one late rider all his full heart sing.
II
I rose, and musing looked across the Bay,
Hearing the world’s wide ocean whisper low,
And marked the moonlight, like a broken bow,
Lie on the water in a lace of spray.
Yet I was in a dream-world far away,
Seeing great oleanders all a-blow,
Where, like tall candles, lilies, row on row,
Bloomed where the hot night matched the burning day
And as I stood, I saw no more the Main,
But looked on Malebo and all her pines,
The lanes that wound between the glistening vines,
The golden river, and the fields of grain;
And time was driven backward where it ran,
And I a child again where I began.
III
And then I turned to watch the wave uprear
In mantling crest, and leap in sudden shock
Upon the cliffy barrier of rock
As though some self within had flung it there!
Once I had thought it matched with man—a snare
By which at life’s realities we mock,
For now I stood, a prisoner in life’s dock,
With reason challenged by a whinnying mare.
We make no answer to the sea, the sun!
But all the common cries of life are one.
There is no life-call but has human range,
And so, though maybe some will think it strange,
The sound of that thin whinny by the sea,
All day among the streets it followed me.
(Dame Mary Gilmore DBE)
More Poetry from Dame Mary Gilmore DBE:
Dame Mary Gilmore DBE Poems based on Topics: Night, Life, Time, World, Light, Water, Boredom, Self- The Brucedale Scandal (Dame Mary Gilmore DBE Poems)
- The Bull (Dame Mary Gilmore DBE Poems)
- Mother And Son (Dame Mary Gilmore DBE Poems)
- Casterton To Mount Gambier (Dame Mary Gilmore DBE Poems)
- The Wild Horses (Dame Mary Gilmore DBE Poems)
- Paddy Mannion's Song Of The Road (Dame Mary Gilmore DBE Poems)
Readers Who Like This Poem Also Like:
Based on Topics: Life Poems, World Poems, Night Poems, Light Poems, Time Poems, Water Poems, Self Poems, Boredom PoemsBased on Keywords: man-, whinny, uprear, whinnying, oleanders, cantering, dream-world, core-, a-blow, cliffy, cartwright