Poem by Sara Teasdale

Lights

  When we come home at night and close the door,
   Standing together in the shadowy room,
   Safe in our own love and the gentle gloom,
  Glad of familiar wall and chair and floor,

  Glad to leave far below the clanging city;
   Looking far downward to the glaring street
   Gaudy with light, yet tired with many feet,
  In both of us wells up a wordless pity;

  Men have tried hard to put away the dark;
   A million lighted windows brilliantly
      Inlay with squares of gold the winter night,
  But to us standing here there comes the stark
      Sense of the lives behind each yellow light,
   And not one wholly joyous, proud, or free.

1. In a Cuban Garden
2. Understanding
3. Bells
4. The Nights Remember
5. Let It Be Forgotten

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