Poem by Claude McKay

Absence

Your words dropped into my heart like pebbles into a pool, 
Rippling around my breast and leaving it melting cool. 

Your kisses fell sharp on my flesh like dawn-dews from the limb, 
Of a fruit-filled lemon tree when the day is young and dim. 

But a silence vasty-deep, oh deeper than all these ties 
Now, through the menacing miles, brooding between us lies. 

And more than the songs I sing, I await your written word, 
To stir my fluent blood as never your presence stirred.

1. Exhortation: Summer 1919
2. Winter in the Country
3. Alfonso, Dressing to Wait at Table
4. Spring in New Hampshire
5. The White City

Bessie Parkes Absence ("I AM not lonely, O my Love")

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