Haunted

    A time of drought had sucked the weedy pool

    And baked the channels； birds had done with song.

    Thirst was a dream of fountains in the moon

    Or willow-music blown across the water

    Leisurely¹ sliding on by weir² and mill.

    Uneasy was the man who wandered brooding

    His face a little #CCCCFFr than the dusk.

    A drone of sultry wings flicker‘d in his head.

    The end of sunset burning thro‘ the boughs³

    Died in a smear⁴ of red； exhausted⁵ hours

    Cumber‘d and ugly sorrows hemmed⁶ him in.

    He thought： ‘Somewhere there’s thunder ‘ as he strove

    To shake off dread⁷； he dared not look behind him

    But stood the sweat of horror on his face.

    He blunder‘d down a path trampling⁸ on thistles

    In sudden race to leave the ghostly trees.

    And： ‘Soon I’ll be in open fields ‘ he thought

    And half remembered starlight on the meadows

    Scent⁹ of mown grass and voices of tired men

    Fading along the field-paths； home and sleep

    And cool-swept upland spaces whispering leaves

    And far off the long churring night-jar‘s note.

    But something in the wood trying to daunt¹⁰ him

    Led him confused in circles through the thicket¹¹.

    He was forgetting his old wretched folly¹²

    And freedom was his need； his throat was choking.

    Barbed brambles gripped and clawed him round his legs

    And he floundered over snags and hidden stumps¹³.

    Mumbling¹⁴： ‘I will get out！ I must get out！’

    Butting¹⁵ and thrusting up the baffling gloom

    Pausing to listen in a space ‘twixt thorns

    He peers around with peering frantic¹⁶ eyes.

    An evil creature in the twilight¹⁷ looping

    Flapped blindly in his face. Beating it off

    He screeched¹⁸ in terror and straightway something clambered

    Heavily from an oak and dropped bent¹⁹ double

    To shamble at him zigzag²⁰ squat²¹ and bestial²².

    Headlong he charges down the wood and falls

    With roaring brain—agony—the snap‘t spark—

    And blots²³ of green and purple in his eyes.

    Then the slow fingers groping on his neck

    And at his heart the strangling clasp of death.