Duncan Campbell Scott (1862-1947)
Enigma
1Some men are born to gather women's tears,
2To give a harbour to their timorous fears,
3To take them as the dry earth takes the rain,
4As the dark wood the warm wind from the plain;
5Yet their own tears remain unshed,
6Their own tumultuous fears unsaid,
7And, seeming steadfast as the forest and the earth,
8Shaken are they with pain.
9They cry for voice as earth might cry for the sea
10Or the wood for consuming fire;
11Unanswered they remain
12Subject to the sorrows of women utterly --
13Heart and mind,
14Subject as the dry earth to the rain
15Or the dark wood to the wind.
Online text copyright © 2009, Ian Lancashire (the Department of English) and the University of Toronto.
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.
Original text: Duncan Campbell Scott, The Green Cloister: Later Poems (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1935): 69. PS 8487 C6G7 Robarts Library
First publication date:
1935
RPO poem editor: Ian Lancashire
RP edition: RPO 1998.
Recent editing: 2:2002/4/10
Rhyme: irregularly rhyming
Other poems by Duncan Campbell Scott
