By The Fire
Aldous Leonard Huxley 1894 (Aldous Leonard Huxley Godalming, Surrey) – 1963 (Los Angeles County, California)
We who are lovers sit by the fire,
Cradled warm 'twixt thought and will,
Sit and drowse like sleeping dogs
In the equipoise of all desire,
Sit and listen to the still
Small hiss and whisper of green logs
That burn away, that burn away
With the sound of a far-off falling stream
Of threaded water blown to steam,
Grey ghost in the mountain world of grey.
Vapours blue as distance rise
Between the hissing logs that show
A glimpse of rosy heat below;
And candles watch with tireless eyes
While we sit drowsing here. I know,
Dimly, that there exists a world,
That there is time perhaps, and space
Other and wider than this place,
Where at the fireside drowsily curled
We hear the whisper and watch the flame
Burn blinkless and inscrutable.
And then I know those other names
That through my brain from cell to cell
Echo--reverberated shout
Of waiters mournful along corridors:
But nobody carries the orders out,
And the names (dear friends, your name and yours)
Evoke no sign. But here I sit
On the wide hearth, and there are you:
That is enough and only true.
The world and the friends that lived in it
Are shadows: you alone remain
Real in this drowsing room,
Full of the whispers of distant rain
And candles staring into the gloom.
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Submitted on August 03, 2020
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:07 min read
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Quick analysis:
Scheme | ABCABDEFFEGHHGHIJJIKLMNOPOQRSSRTUTU |
---|---|
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,196 |
Words | 224 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 35 |
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"By The Fire" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 10 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/54654/by-the-fire>.
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