Classic and Contemporary Poetry
QUIET HOUSE, by CHARLOTTE MEW Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: When we were children old nurse used to say Last Line: I do not care; some day I shall not think; I shall not be Subject(s): Home | ||||||||
WHEN we were children old Nurse used to say, The house was like an auction or a fair Until the lot of us were safe in bed. It has been quiet as the country-side Since Ted and Janey and then Mother died And Tom crossed Father and was sent away. After the lawsuit he could not hold up his head, Poor Father, and he does not care For people here, or to go anywhere. To get away to Aunt's for that week-end Was hard enough; (since then, a year ago, He scarcely lets me slip out of his sight - ) At first I did not like my cousin's friend, I did not think I should remember him: His voice has gone, his face is growing dim And if I like him now I do not know. He frightened me before he smiled - He did not ask me if he might - He said that he would come one Sunday night, He spoke to me as if I were a child. No year has been like this that has just gone by; It may be that what Father says is true, If things are so it does not matter why: But everything has burned, and not quite through. The colours of the world have turned To flame, the blue, the gold has burned In what used to be such a leaden sky. When you are burned quite through you die. Red is the strangest pain to bear; In Spring the leaves on the budding trees; In Summer the roses are worse than these, More terrible than they are sweet: A rose can stab you across the street Deeper than any knife: And the crimson haunts you everywhere - Thin shafts of sunlight, like the ghosts of reddened swords have struck our stair As if, coming down, you had spilt your life. I think that my soul is red Like the soul of a sword or a scarlet flower: But when these are dead They have had their hour. I shall have had mine, too, For from head to feet I am burned and stabbed half through, And the pain is deadly sweet. The things that kill us seem Blind to the death they give: It is only in our dream The things that kill us live. The room is shut where Mother died, The other rooms are as they were, The world goes on the same outside, The sparrows fly across the Square, The children play as we four did there, The trees grow green and brown and bare, The sun shines on the dead Church spire, And nothing lives here but the fire. While Father watches from his chair Day follows day The same, or now and then a different grey, Till, like his hair, Which Mother said was wavy once and bright, They will all turn white. To-night I heard a bell again - Outside it was the same mist of fine rain, The lamps just lighted down the long, dim street, No one for me - I think it is myself I go to meet: I do not care; some day I shall not think; I shall not be. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...EL FLORIDA ROOM by RICHARD BLANCO DESTINATIONS by JOSEPHINE JACOBSEN TO THIS HOUSE by ROBINSON JEFFERS THE UPSTAIRS ROOM by WELDON KEES HOME IS SO SAD by PHILIP LARKIN DUTCH INTERIOR by DAVID LEHMAN |
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