Poem by Elinor Wylie

August

Why should this Negro insolently stride 
Down the red noonday on such noiseless feet? 
Piled in his barrow, tawnier than wheat, 
Lie heaps of smouldering daisies, sombre-eyed, 
Their copper petals shriveled up with pride, 
Hot with a superfluity of heat, 
Like a great brazier borne along the street 
By captive leopards, black and burning pied.

Are there no water-lilies, smooth as cream, 
With long stems dripping crystal? Are there none 
Like those white lilies, luminous and cool, 
Plucked from some hemlock-darkened northern stream 
By fair-haired swimmers, diving where the sun 
Scarce warms the surface of the deepest pool?

1. In Our Content, before the Autumn Came
2. Upon Your Heart, Which Is.the Heart of All
3. The Little Beauty That I Was Allowed
4. What Other Name Had Half Expressed the Whole
5. The Pekingese

Dorothy Parker August ("When my eyes are weeds")

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