Poetry Explorer


Classic and Contemporary Poetry


LOST DREAM by GEORGE WILLIAM RUSSELL

First Line: THE UNLEASHED AIR

THE unleashed air,
A wild cold animal,
Hunts on the hills.


Yet the hollow amid the rocks Is brimful of quiet,
So quiet
Faery may be heard:
So still
There is not a flicker
In the candle of dream .


The warm East Is at my feet.
In burning blue
Lagoon beyond lagoon
Faints shimmering,
All lotus besprinkled -
Rose lotuses!


A woman leans,
A dream out of Allah.
The water quivers
In ivory ringlets
Beneath her fingers
As she plucks the blossom she twines
In the dark shining of her hair.


She stands;
Stillness in ivory!
But ere I see her eyes,
Ere I make them mine,
The wild cold animal
Leaps into the hollow.
The candle flickers and is blown;
The paths all are darkened.
A dream has lost its way to life.




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