You have tired me with your words.
Words that once were radiant things,
Words that were smothered cries, were whips,
The quiver of fire, the call of birds,
Now have an utterance that flings
A taste like dust upon my lips.

You have hurt me with your rhyme;
It is a bell that has rung too long.
My ear is hungry for a word
Without a haunting, hollow chime.
I am thirsty for an unwooed song
That shall be felt and never heard.

Your lines are swarms of narrow bees
Spreading above my hive of thought
The droning of their baffled flight.
Now is no pang of breathing; these
Slow moments know no quiet caught
To sudden sound, no shaft of light.