Ts'ai Chi'h
The petals fall in the fountain,
the orange coloured rose-leaves,
Their ochre clings to the stone.
This poem is in the public domain.
I make truce with you, Walt Whitman—
I have detested you long enough.
I come to you as a grown child
Who has had a pig-headed father;
I am old enough now to make friends.
It was you that broke the new wood,
Now is a time for carving.
We have one sap and one root—
Let there be commerce between us.
Great bulk, huge mass, thesaurus; Ecbatan, the block ticks and fades out; The bride awaiting the god’s touch; Ecbatan, City of patterned streets; again the vision: Down in the viae stradae, toga’d the crowd, and arm’d Rushing on populous buriness, and from parapets Looked down—at North Was Egypt, and the celestial Nile, blue-deep cutting low barren lands, Old men and camels working the water-wheels; Measureless seas and stars, Iamblichus’ light, the souls ascending, Sparks like a partridge covey, Like the “ciocco,” brand struck
O fan of white silk,
clear as frost on the grass-blade,
You also are laid aside.