Auden is to be read sitting beside your window, during the silence when the creaking crickets pause for breathe on a moonless night, with a golden lamp lighting the page and a green snake twirled around your neck for company -
But all the clocks in the city
Began to whirr and chime:
"O let not Time deceive you
You cannot conquer Time.
"In the burrows of the Nightmare
Where Justice naked is,
Time watches from the shadow
And coughs when you would kiss.
"In headaches and in worry
Vaguely life leaks away,
And time will have his fancy
To-morrow or to-day.
"Into many a green valley
Drifts the appalling snow
Time breaks the threaded dances
And the diver's brilliant bow.
"O plunge your hands in water
Plunge them up to the wrist;
Stare, stare in the basin
And wonder what you've missed."
"The glacier knocks in the cupboard,
The desert sighs in the bed,
And the crack in the tea-cup opens
A lane to the land of the dead.
"Where the beggars raffle the banknotes
And the Giant is enchanting to Jack,
And the Lily-white Boy is a Roarer
And Jill goes down on her back."
"O look, look in the mirror,
O look in your distress;
Life remains a blessing
Although you cannot bless."
"O stand, stand at the window
As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbor
With your crooked heart."
It was late, late in the evening
The lovers they were gone;
The clocks had ceased their chiming,
And the deep river ran on.
But all the clocks in the city
Began to whirr and chime:
"O let not Time deceive you
You cannot conquer Time.
"In the burrows of the Nightmare
Where Justice naked is,
Time watches from the shadow
And coughs when you would kiss.
"In headaches and in worry
Vaguely life leaks away,
And time will have his fancy
To-morrow or to-day.
"Into many a green valley
Drifts the appalling snow
Time breaks the threaded dances
And the diver's brilliant bow.
"O plunge your hands in water
Plunge them up to the wrist;
Stare, stare in the basin
And wonder what you've missed."
"The glacier knocks in the cupboard,
The desert sighs in the bed,
And the crack in the tea-cup opens
A lane to the land of the dead.
"Where the beggars raffle the banknotes
And the Giant is enchanting to Jack,
And the Lily-white Boy is a Roarer
And Jill goes down on her back."
"O look, look in the mirror,
O look in your distress;
Life remains a blessing
Although you cannot bless."
"O stand, stand at the window
As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbor
With your crooked heart."
It was late, late in the evening
The lovers they were gone;
The clocks had ceased their chiming,
And the deep river ran on.
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