How Did I Bear It

How did I bear it—how could I possibly as a child,
On my narrow shoulders and pipe-stem legs have supported 
The fragrance and the colour of the frangible hour, the deep 
Taste of the shallow dish?—It is not as if
I had thought, being a child, that the beautiful thing would 
     last: it passed while I looked at it,
Except, of course, in memory-memory is the seventh 
Colour in the spectrum. But I knew about—when even then, 
The grapevine growing over the grey rock—the shock 
Of beauty seen, noticed, for the first time—
I remember it well-and I remember where I stood—on which 
     side of the rock.

Already the triangular leaves on the grape-trellis are green; they
     have given me no time
To report their colour as it was when I first
Came upon them, wondering if the strawberry rhubarb was up, 
     looking for the pretty, feared hoof-marks of deer
In the asparagus.

How did I bear it?—Now—grown up and encased 
In the armour of custom, after years
Of looking at loveliness, forewarned and face to face, and no 
     time and too prudent
At six in the morning to accept the unendurable embrace,

I come back from the garden into the kitchen, and take off my 
     rubbers—the dew
Is heavy and high, wetting the sock above the shoe—but I
     cannot do
The housework yet.