Grey Room

Painting by Cindy Davis


Gray Room


Although you sit in a room that is gray,
Except for the silver
Of the straw-paper,
And pick
At your pale white gown;
Or lift one of the green beads
Of your necklace,
To let it fall;
Or gaze at your green fan
Printed with the red branches
of a red willow;
Or, with one finger,
Move the leaf in the bowl--
The leaf that has fallen
from the branches of the forsythia
Beside you...
What is all this?
I know how furiously your heart
is beating.

Wallace Stevens

Posted over on Poemhunter