Page:Collected poems Robinson, Edwin Arlington.djvu/344

 Laurel, to make me know For certain what they mean : That now my Fate, my Queen, Having found that she, by way of right reward, Will after madness go remembering, And laurel be as grass, Remembers the one thing That she has left to bring. The floor about me now is like a sward Grown royally. Now it is like a sea That heaves with laurel heavily, Surrendering an outworn enmity For what has come to be. But not for you, returning with your curled And haggish lips. And why are you alone? Why do you stay when all the rest are gone? Why do you bring those treacherous eyes that reek With venom and hate the while you seek To make me understand? Laurel from every land, Laurel, but not the world? Fury, or perjured Fate, or whatsoever, Tell me the bloodshot word that is your name And I will pledge remembrance of the same That shall be crossed out never; Whereby posterity May know, being told, that you have come to me, You and your tongueless train without a sound, With covetous hands and eyes and laurel all around, Foreshowing your endeavor To mirror me the demon of my days, To make me doubt him, loathe him, face to face. Bowed with unwilling glory from the quest