THE WINDING STAIR AND OTHER POEMS
 
 IN MEMORY OF EVA GORE-BOOTH AND CON MARKIEWICZ
 
 THE light of evening, Lissadell,
 Great windows open to the south,
 Two girls in silk kimonos, both
 Beautiful, one a gazelle.
 But a raving autumn shears
 Blossom from the summer's wreath;
 The older is condemned to death,
 Pardoned, drags out lonely years
 Conspiring among the ignorant.
 I know not what the younger dreams –
 Some vague Utopia – and she seems,
 When withered old and skeleton-gaunt,
 An image of such politics.
 Many a time I think to seek
 One or the other out and speak
 Of that old Georgian mansion, mix
 pictures of the mind, recall
 That table and the talk of youth,
 Two girls in silk kimonos, both
 Beautiful, one a gazelle.
 Dear shadows, now you know it all,
 All the folly of a fight
 With a common wrong or right.
 The innocent and the beautiful.
 Have no enemy but time;
 Arise and bid me strike a match
 And strike another till time catch;
 Should the conflagration climb,
 Run till all the sages know.
 We the great gazebo built,
 They convicted us of guilt;
 Bid me strike a match and blow.