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Listening. Round metal cleared. My grinning serpents flew at his feathered heels, Beat down, and Spring tore offtheir skins. He placed his armor on the stair oflight And bent to take my yellowed head, His muscles gliding naked in the mirror Ofthe air, his face warm as a man's Who shall hold at his breast the look To freeze his peaceful cities to the stone Lamp ofevery room, though over plotted graves He bear it in trembling gentleness, till it be richened With the stars between the ships ofall the bays, And nail it to the ground in secret weeping. The Courtship Though lumber was scarce, we found it, Trading with rations ofwhiskey, And began to build on the clifftop Not a tent with a floor, but a house Above the ragged island which had changed To peace one night while we slept: A three-room house with a view, A porch, two rugs, and a kitchen. All ends ingentleness. It was not a place to bring girls We would marry, but we liked To think ofbringing others: Perhaps those, in the flesh, Cut out ofpolished magazines And smiling like a harem from our walls. Each fluttered on her four nails As we cut windows near her in the wind. All ends ingentleness. The live slats under our camp chairs Rocked, as we drank tea, becalmed, Our missions done, seeing the earth No longer from aircraft, but a porch The Courtship / I3 We had built for idling upon. In shorts and unmartial attire We kept the high house for officers And gentlemen, and dozed for weeks. All ends ingentleness. Yet strange claims settled upon us For this was becoming home. Each thought for the first time ofchildren By an unknown woman he should love Enough to go back to war for, Who kept this house by unlikeness To the slick girls who trembled and chattered All day and night on our walls. All ends ingentleness. Before we moved out, our girls, Their immortal skin in tatters, Flaked strangely away, still smiling, And while we awaited that day A captain went down the cliff On a rope, each dangerous evening, To bring back blue, foreign flowers For no one, to place on the table. All ends ingentleness. Summons / I4 ...

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