March Mournful and Vertical

I stare at the ceiling's plasterwork.
I'm drawn into the dance of the meanders.
My happiness, I'm thinking, would
lie in height.

Symbols of the higher life:
unchanging, transubstantiated roses;
a white acanthus border round a
horn of plenty.

(Humble, unpretentious craft,
how sluggishly I learn your lesson!)
Bas-relief dream, I'll come to you
vertically.

Horizons will have smothered me.
In every climate, every latitude,
the struggle for one's bread and salt,
the love-affairs, the boredom.

Ah! now I ought to wear
that lovely plaster garland.
So, with the ceiling as my frame,
I'll be adored.

I stare at the ceiling's plasterwork.
I'm drawn into the dance of the meanders.
My happiness, I'm thinking, would
lie in height.

Symbols of the higher life:
unchanging, transubstantiated roses;
a white acanthus border round a
horn of plenty.

(Humble, unpretentious craft,
how sluggishly I learn your lesson!)
Bas-relief dream, I'll come to you
vertically.

Horizons will have smothered me.
In every climate, every latitude,
the struggle for one's bread and salt,
the love-affairs, the boredom.

Ah! now I ought to wear
that lovely plaster garland.
So, with the ceiling as my frame,
I'll be adored.