Caroling Dusk/Flame-heart
For other versions of this work, see Flame-Heart.
FLAME-HEART[1]
So much have I forgotten in ten years, So much in ten brief years! I have forgotWhat time the purple apples come to juice, And what month brings the shy forget-me-not. I have forgot the special, startling season Of the pimento’s flowering and fruiting;What time of year the ground doves brown the fields And fill the noonday with their curious fluting.I have forgotten much, but still rememberThe poinsettia’s red, blood-red in warm December.
I still recall the honey-fever grass, But cannot recollect the high days whenWe rooted them out of the ping-wing path To stop the mad bees in the rabbit pen.I often try to think in what sweet month The languid painted ladies used to dappleThe yellow by-road mazing from the main, Sweet with the golden threads of the rose-apple.I have forgotten—strange—but quite rememberThe poinsettia’s red, blood-red in warm December.
What weeks, what months, what time of the mild year We cheated school to have our fling at tops?What days our wine-thrilled bodies pulsed with joy Feasting upon blackberries in the copse?Oh, some I know! I have embalmed the days, Even the sacred moments when we played,All innocent of passion, uncorrupt, At noon and evening in the flame-heart’s shade.We were so happy, happy, I remember,Beneath the poinsettia’s red in warm December.
- ↑ From “Harlem Shadows” by Claude McKay, Copyright 1922, by Harcourt, Brace & Company, Inc.