THE LAST DREAM OF VIRGINIA WOOLF

 

 

"Thinking of rodhodendron forests in Piccadilly" 

(Virginia Woolf)

"In broad nightlight 

                                  tonight

chatting with the realm of darkness

my words have taken in the colour

                                    of rhododendrons

bordering late-blooming paths, 

                                          abandoned castles,

mossy bridges where the crows

                             land brooding at sundown.

In broad-dim nightlight

shall not come the moths

 to flit around the tired splendour

                              of my words,

words tinged with the pale pink

through which, oftentimes,

                    the faces of memory

entice Hebe into the forest of Elvedon,

faces as pure as the stork flight at dawn, 

                   faces with susurrous voices

of blue-girl in darkness...

this is you around, Percival

this is you, Rhoda?.

faces that whisper me

with a seraphic language

                                   of wave or ringdove.

And I whisper back to them 

                        like buttlerflies smouldering

 in the candle flame to be ashes"