Page:Marlborough and other poems, Sorley, 1919.djvu/69

 XVII

THE RIVER

watched the river running black

Beneath the blacker sky;

It did not pause upon its track

Of silent instancy;

It did not hasten, nor was slack,

But still went gliding by.

It was so black. There was no wind

Its patience to defy.

It was not that the man had sinned,

Or that he wished to die.

Only the wide and silent tide

Went slowly sweeping by.

The mass of blackness moving down

Filled full of dreams the eye;

The lights of all the lighted town

Upon its breast did lie;

The tall black trees were upside down

In the river phantasy.

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