WHITE SYMPHONY I Forlorn and white, Whorls of purity about a golden chalice, Immense the peonies Flare and shatter their petals over my face. They slowly turn paler, They seem to be melting like blue-grey flakes of ice, Thin greyish shivers Fluctuating mid the dark green lance-thrust of the leaves. Like snowballs tossed, Like soft white butterflies, The peonies poise in the twilight. And their narcotic insinuating perfume Draws me into them Shivering with the coolness, Aching with the void. They kiss the blue chalice of my dreams Like a gesture seen for an instant and then lost forever. 

 Outwards the petals Thrust to embrace me, Pale daggers of coldness Run through my aching breast. Outwards, still outwards, Till on the brink of twilight They swirl downwards silently, Flurry of snow in the void. Outwards, still outwards, Till the blue walls are hidden, And in the blinding white radiance Of a whirlpool of clouds, I awake. 

 Like spraying rockets My peonies shower Their glories on the night. Wavering perfumes, Drift about the garden; Shadows of the moonlight, Drift and ripple over the dew-gemmed leaves. Soar, crash, and sparkle, Shoal of stars drifting Like silver fishes, Through the black sluggish boughs. Towards the impossible, Towards the inaccessible, Towards the ultimate, Towards the silence, Towards the eternal, These blossoms go. The peonies spring like rockets in the twilight, And out of them all I rise. II Downwards through the blue abyss it slides, The white snow-water of my dreams, Downwards crashing from slippery rock Into the boiling chasm: In which no eye dare look, for it is the chasm of death. Upwards from the blue abyss it rises, The chill water-mist of my dreams; Upwards to greyish weeping pines, And to skies of autumn ever about my heart, It is blue at the beginning, And blue-white against the grey-greenness; It wavers in the upper air, Catching unconscious sparkles, a rainbow-glint of sunlight, And fading in the sad depths of the sky. Outwards rush the strong pale clouds, Outwards and ever outwards; The blue-grey clouds indistinguishable one from another: Nervous, sinewy, tossing their arms and brandishing, Till on the blue serrations of the horizon They drench with their black rain a great peak of changeless snow. 

 As evening came on, I climbed the tower, To gaze upon the city far beneath: I was not weary of day; but in the evening A white mist assembled and gathered over the earth And blotted it from sight. But to escape: To chase with the golden clouds galloping over the horizon: Arrows of the northwest wind Singing amid them, Ruffling up my hair! As evening 

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