A sunset, Aldous Huxley


A SUNSET

OVER against the triumph and the close—

  Amber and green and rose—

    Of this short day,

The pale ghost of the moon grows living-bright

  Once more, as the last light

    Ebbs slowly away.

Darkening the fringes of these western glories

  The black phantasmagories

    Of cloud advance

With noiseless footing—vague and villainous shapes,

  Wrapped in their ragged fustian capes,

    Of some grotesque romance.

But overhead where, like a pool between

  Dark rocks, the sky is green

    And clear and deep,

Floats windlessly a cloud, with curving breast

  Flushed by the fiery west,

    In god-like sleep . . .

And in my mind opens a sudden door

  That lets me see once more

    A little room

With night beyond the window, chill and damp,

  And one green-lighted lamp

    Tempering the gloom,

While here within, close to me, touching me

  (Even the memory

    Of my desire

Shakes me like fear), you sit with scattered hair;

  And all your body bare

    Before the fire

Is lapped about with rosy flame. . . . But still,

  Here on the lonely hill,

    I walk alone;

Silvery green is the moon’s lamp overhead,

  The cloud sleeps warm and red,

    And you are gone.


The end