SELECTIONS IN ENGLISH POETRY
In an obscure corner. 45
Not an instant I
I flicked him on,
Trying to drive him through the window.
Again he swerved into the window bay
And I ran forward, to frighten him forth, . 50
But he rose, and from a terror worse than me he flew
past me
Back into my room, and round, round, round in my
room
Clutch, cleave, stagger,
Dropping about the air,
Getting tired- 55
Something seemed to blow him back from the window
Every time he swerved at it;
Back on a strange parabola, then round, round, dizzy
in my room.
He could not go out,
I also realised............ 60
It was the light of day which he could not enter,
Any more than I could enter the white-hot door of a
blast furnace.
He could not plunge into the daylight that streamed
at the window.
It was asking too much of his nature.
Worse even than the hideous terror of me with my
handkerchief
Saying: out, go out 1............ 66
*Was the horror of white daylight in the window 1
349