Page:Anthology of Magazine Verse (1921).djvu/186

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ICE AGE
Noiselessly the planets will blow by
Like smoke, like breath, like driven snow,
Frost-bitten suns on on, on on will blow,
Over earth's curve, the moons, like birds, will fly
Making no noise and only vague shadow.

And spider snow will spin and spin
A tangle of frost to snare earth in.

Little earth, then
Will house few men,
Little earth, shrunken,
No longer drunken
Purple, splendid, roistering earth;
Little earth hung
With pearls of seas,
Little earth shivering,
About to freeze.

And through her veins, caught in this web
Life and color and sound will ebb.

There will be faint tints, none
From the center of the sun.

There will be light noises, no
Sound harsher than snow.

Never a sound of thunder or river,
Torrent or stone,
Only vague breath from the old life-giver,
Making her own
Final, lingering filagree
Of frost blown
On the glass of the sky, in planet and tree
An icicle moon, a torrent and three

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