TOWN

And up in the sky

A two-eyed clock, like an owl

Solemnly used to approve, chime, chiming,

Approval, goggle-eyed fowl.

There are no gleams on the River,

No goggling clock;

No sound from St. Stephen's;

No lamp-fringed frock.

Instead,

Darkness, and skin-wrapped

Fleet, hurrying limbs,

Soft-footed dead.

London

Original, wolf-wrapped

In pelts of wolves, all her luminous

Garments gone.

London, with hair

Like a forest darkness, like a marsh

Of rushes, ere the Romans

Broke in her lair.

It is well

That London, lair of sudden

Male and female darknesses

Has broken her spell.