POEMS FROM A TIME: TO CHANGE^ A TIME TO CHANGE (To My Mother) So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spue thee out of my mouth. Revelation 4, 16. We who leave the house in April, Lord, How shall we return? Debtors to the whore of Love, Corrupted by the things imagined Through the winter nights, alone, The flesh defiled by dreams of flesh, Rehearsed desire dead in spring, How shall we return? The juice of life is in us still But when the mind determines everything The leap is never made, the music Never quite completed, redemption Never ful1y won From what has been, but always And anywhere, in London or in Rome, The amputated gestures, eyes turned away, Incomplete absorption in the common scene, Cramped, sedentary, in silent rooms, Marking time on unknown ground With faults concealedo Witness to the small rain and sundry mists, Half-hearted birds, uncertain dawns, Here in April we are waiting For passages of pure creation or simply Girls, lighly dressed and light of heart, Determined that the door be never shut. For lovers may be satisfied with love Or sated with a woman, But who can say: There shall be no more surprises, Discovery of cities fresh as brides, Bright legends of a recent birth, *From A Time to Change (London: The Fortune Press, 1952). Reprinted by permission of the author and the publishers,