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Classic and Contemporary Poetry


TRAGIC NIGHT by JOHN GOULD FLETCHER

First Line: RAIN, AND A GLARE OF LAMPS SET IN THE RAIN
Last Line: BUT LIVING HOLDS HELL'S INFINITE DISTRESS.
Subject(s): DESPAIR; LONDON; NIGHT; BEDTIME;

RAIN, and a glare of lamps set in the rain,
Where seekers for numb brains and deadened wills
Stagger like helpless idiots through the pain
Of vain remembrance of increasing ills.
The dazzle of light in the darkness thickly fills
The breadth of street with long and snake-like stain
Of false gold, which the weak sight blinds and kills,
While through it all come slipping by amain,
Like vast black birds of prey with eyes aglow,
The automobiles, 'mid shrieks and howls of lust;
No deeper tragedy the earth can know
Than this, its night of pain and rain and rust,
Where death is only death and nothingness,
But living holds hell's infinite distress.



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