Having pushed open the narrow wobbling gate,
I strolled around in the little garden
Gently illuminated by the morning sun
Spangling each flower with a damp flash of light.
The simple arbor: it’s all still here, nothing’s different,
The madly-growing vines, the chairs of cane…
Always making its silver murmur, the fountain,
And the old aspen its perpetual lament.
Just as before, the roses throb; as before,
the huge proud lilies waver in the air.
I know every lark, coming and going.
I’ve even found the statue of the barbarian prophetess
Still upright down the walk, her plaster spalling
—Slender, amid the mignonette’s insipidities.
.
