Clark Ashton Smith Poems

This wakeful death affords not any rift
where root of weed or blossom cleaves the tomb.
Ungrown as yet, no yewen bowers lift,
bringing serene misericordal gloom
...

To me, who have but known
The senses' doubtful lore,
Thy soul is evermore
Mysterious as mine own.
...

When our pails were brimmed,
Mushrooms white and brown
Clustered where the slope went down.
...

Stiff and brown and dusty—
Coffined in the drawer,
I found the oleander-flower:
The love that in your tresses died,
...

From out the light of many a mightier day,
From Pharaonic splendour, Memphian gloom,
And from the night aeonian of the tomb
They brought him forth, to meet the modern ray,—
...

When I saw you dance,
Milesian roses swayed in the wind
Of a lost romance.
...

Incumbent seemingly
On the serrate points of peaks
That end the visible west,
The rounded moon yet floods
...

Twilight dim and gray,
The last, red rays of the sun;
And slowly dieth the day,
Its work is done.
...

The fires of sunset die reluctantly
As goes the kingly Day to seek his rest,
And Night, the sable queen, comes sombrely,
In dusky robes, with stars upon her breast.
...

Lady, be the chatelaine
Of my vagrant dreams and vain:
Knowing naught is true and fair
Save the love that is despair,
...