Flood by James Joyce | Poets.org


February 3, 2013 · 5:59 PM

Flood

by James Joyce

 

Gold-brown upon the sated flood

The rock-vine clusters lift and sway:

Vast wings above the lambent waters brood

Of sullen day.

 

A waste of waters ruthlessly

Sways and uplifts its weedy mane,

Where brooding day stares down upon the sea

In dull disdain.

 

Uplift and sway, O golden vine,

Thy clustered fruits to love's full flood,

Lambent and vast and ruthless as is thine

Incertitude.

Born in Dublin, James Joyce--well-known for his novels Portrait of the Artist as Young Man and Ulysses--also published numerous books of poetry. Ezra Pound championed his work and included Joyce's poems in his Imagist Anthology.

 

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