Memory / John Dos Passos

Memory
Between rounded hills, White with patches of buckwheat, whose fragrance fills The little breeze that makes the birch-leaves quiver, Beside a rollicking swift river, Light green in the deeps,— Like your eyes in sunshine,— Winds the canal, Lazy and brown as a water-snake, Full of dazzle and sheen where the breeze sweeps The water with gossamer garments, that shake The reeds standing sentinel, And the marginal line Of birches and willows.

Our little steamer pulls its way With jingle of bells and panting throb Of old engines. In stiff array The water-reeds wave, And solemnly sway To the wash and swell of our passing. Among the reeds the ripples sob, And die away, 'Till the canal is still again, save For a kingfisher's flashing Across the noon shimmer.

I stood beside you in the bow, Watched the sunlight lose itself among your hair, That the breeze tugged at. Bright as the shattered sun-rays, where the prow Cut the still water, The warm light caught and tangled there, Red gold amid your hair.

You were very slim in your blue serge dress.... We talked of meaningless things, education, Agreed that unless, Something were changed disaster would come to the nation. You smiled when I pointed where A group of birches shivered in the green wood-shadow, Up to their knees in water, white and fair As dryads bathing. A row Of flat white houses and a wharf Glided in sight. The hoarse whistle shrieked for a landing; Bells jangled.... You were standing A slim blue figure amid the wharf's crowd; The little steamer creaked against the side, loud Screamed the whistle again....

Monotonously the solemn reeds Waved to our passing; Ahead the canal shimmered, blotched green by the water-weeds. With a grinding swing And see-saw of sound, The steamer slunk down the canal.

I never even knew your name....

That night from a dingy hotel room, I saw the moon, like a golden gong, Redly loom Across the lake; like a golden gong In a temple, which a priest ere long Will strike into throbbing song, To wake some silent twinkling city to prayer. The lake waves were flakes of red gold, Burnished to copper, Gold, red as the tangled gleam Of sunlight in your hair.