Rupert Chawner Brooke


Waikiki


 Warm perfumes like a breath from vine and tree
   Drift down the darkness. Plangent, hidden from eyes,
   Somewhere an _eukaleli_ thrills and cries
 And stabs with pain the night's brown savagery.
 And dark scents whisper; and dim waves creep to me,
   Gleam like a woman's hair, stretch out, and rise;
   And new stars burn into the ancient skies,
 Over the murmurous soft Hawaian sea.

 And I recall, lose, grasp, forget again,
   And still remember, a tale I have heard, or known
 An empty tale, of idleness and pain,
   Of two that loved--or did not love--and one
 Whose perplexed heart did evil, foolishly,
 A long while since, and by some other sea.

WAIKIKI, 1913




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