By The Fire

A poem by Aldous Huxley (1894 – 1963)

We who are lovers sit by the fire,

Cradled warm ‘twixt thought and will,

Sit and drowse like sleeping dogs

In the equipoise of all desire,

Sit and listen to the still

Small hiss and whisper of green logs

That burn away, that burn away

With the sound of a far-off falling stream

Of threaded water blown to steam,

Grey ghost in the mountain world of grey.

Vapours blue as distance rise

Between the hissing logs that show

A glimpse of rosy heat below;

And candles watch with tireless eyes

While we sit drowsing here. I know,

Dimly, that there exists a world,

That there is time perhaps, and space

Other and wider than this place,

Where at the fireside drowsily curled

We hear the whisper and watch the flame

Burn blinkless and inscrutable.

And then I know those other names

That through my brain from cell to cell

Echo–reverberated shout

Of waiters mournful along corridors:

But nobody carries the orders out,

And the names (dear friends, your name and yours)

Evoke no sign. But here I sit

On the wide hearth, and there are you:

That is enough and only true.

The world and the friends that lived in it

Are shadows: you alone remain

Real in this drowsing room,

Full of the whispers of distant rain

And candles staring into the gloom.

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Poems in English 

• The Bell Buoy by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• The Ballad of the Red Earl by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• The Ballad of the King’s Mercy by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• The Ballad of the King’s Jest by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• The Ballad of Fisher’s Boarding-House by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• The Ballad of East and West by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• The Answer by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• Tarrant Moss by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• Sussex by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• Study of an Elevation, In Indian Ink by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• South Africa by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• Song of the Wise Children by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• Song of the Red War-Boat by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• Song of Diego Valdez by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• Soldier an’ Sailor Too by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• Snarleyow by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• Sir Richard’s Song by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• Shillin’ a Day by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• Seven Watchmen by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling
• Seal Lullaby by Rudyard Kipling by Rudyard Kipling

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