Sun-Up, and Other Poems Part 2

If you keep very still lizards will think you a stone and run over your lap.

b.u.t.terflies' liveries are scarlet and black.

They drive chariots in air.

People in the chariots are pale as dew-- you can see right through them-- but the chariots are made of gold of the sun.

They go up to heaven and never catch fire.

There are green centipedes and brown centipedes and black centipedes, because green and brown and black are the colors in h.e.l.l's flag.

Centipedes have hundreds of feet because it is so far from h.e.l.l to come up for air.

Centipedes do not hurry.

They are waiting for the last day when they will creep over the false prophets who will have their hands tied.

Night calls to the sandhills and gathers them under her.

she pushes away cities because their sharp lights hurt her soft breast.

Even candles make a sore place when they stick in the night.

There are things in the sandhills that no one knows about...

they come out at dark when the young snakes play and tell each other secrets in the deaf logs.

Sometimes... before rain...

when the stars have gone inside...

the night comes close to your window and sniffs at the light....

But you must not run away-- you must keep your face to the night and walk backward.

When it rains and you are pulling off flies' legs...

mama lets you play houses with Lizzie and Clara.

Because you are the Only One-- and because Only Ones have to live alone while sisters stay together, Lizzie and Clara give you the dry house and take the one with the leaking roof.

Rain like curly hairpins blows on Lizzie and Clara's two heads turned like one head-- two mouths spread into one laugh.

Lizzie is saying: why don't you want to play-- when you feel you'd like to braid the crinkled-silver rain into a s.h.i.+ning rope to climb up... and up... and up... into the wet sky and never see any one again.

Our gate doesn't hang right.

It must have pawed at the wind and gotten a kick as the wind pa.s.sed over.

The sitting sky puffs out a gray smoke and the wind makes a red-striped sound blowing out straight, but our gate drags its foot and whines to itself on one hinge.

What do you think I've found-- two wee knickers of fairy bra.s.s, or two gold sovereigns folded up in a bit of green silk, or two gold bugs in little green s.h.i.+rts?

If you want to know, you must walk tip-toe so your feet just whisper in the gra.s.s-- you must carry them careful and very proud, for their stems bleed drops of milk-- but Lizzie and Clara shout in glee: Pee-a-bed, pee-a-bed-- dandelions!

You look in the eyes of grown-up people to see if they feel the way you feel...

but they hide inside of themselves, and so you do not find out.

Grown-up people say: The stars are bright to-night, but they do not say what you are thinking about stars-- not even mama says what you are thinking about stars.

This makes you feel very lonely.

It's strange about stars....

You have to be still when they look at you.

They push your song inside of you with their song.

Their long silvery rays sink into you and do not hurt.

It is good to feel them resting on you like great white birds...

and their s.h.i.+ning whiteness doesn't burn like the sun-- it washes all over you and makes you feel cleaner'n water.

My doll Janie has no waist and her body is like a tub with feet on it.

Sometimes I beat her but I always kiss her afterwards.

When I have kissed all the paint off her body I shall tie a ribbon about it so she shan't look shabby.

But it must be blue-- it mustn't be pink-- pink shows the dirt on her face that won't wash off.

I beat Janie and beat her...

but still she smiled...

so I scratched her between the eyes with a pin.

Now she doesn't love me anymore...

she scowls... and scowls...

though I've begged her to forgive me and poured sugar in the hole at the back of her head.

Mama says Janie is a fairy doll and she has forgiven me-- that she's gone to the market to buy me some sweets.

--Now she's at the door and a little bag tied to her neck-- I run to Janie and kiss her all over....

Ah... she is still frowning.

I let the sweets drop on the floor-- mama has told you a lie.

Chinaman singing in street: gleen ledd-ish-es, gleen ledd-ish-es-- hot sun s.h.i.+ning on your face-- it must be a new day.

But why aren't you happy if it's a new day?

Because something has happened...

something sad and terrible....

Now I remember... it's Janie.

Yesterday I took Janie out and tied my handkerchief over her face and put sand in it and threw her into the ditch down in the black water under the dock leaves...

and when mama asked me where Janie was I said I had lost her.

I'm glad it is night-time so I'll be able to go to sleep and forget all about it....

But mama looks at my tongue and says she will give me senna tea.

When you smell the tea you shut your eyes tight and pretend not to hear the soft, cool voice of mama that goes over your forehead like a little wind.

And then you lie in the dark and stare... and stare...

till the faces come...

yellow faces with leering eyes drifting in a greeny mist....

I wonder if Janie sees faces out there... alone in the dark....

I wonder if she has got the handkerchief off or if the water has gone in the hole where the whistle was at the back of her head and drowned her...

or if the stars can see her under the dock leaves?