Impression de Nuit ( London )

Lord Alfred Douglas 1870 (Worcestershire) – 1945 (Lancing)



See what a mass of gems the city wears
Upon her broad live bosom! row on row
Rubies and emeralds and amethysts glow.
See! that huge circle like a necklace, stares
With thousands of bold eyes to heaven, and dares
The golden stars to dim the lamps below,
And in the mirror of the mire I know
The moon has left her image unawares.

That's the great town at night: I see her breasts,
Pricked out with lamps they stand like huge black towers.
I think they move! I hear her panting breath.
And that's her head where the tiara rests.
And in her brain, through lanes as dark as death,
Men creep like thoughts...The lamps are like pale flowers

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 10, 2023

37 sec read
181

Quick analysis:

Scheme ABBAABBA CDECED
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 641
Words 123
Stanzas 2
Stanza Lengths 8, 6

Lord Alfred Douglas

Lord Alfred Bruce Douglas, nicknamed Bosie, was a British author, poet and translator, better known as the friend and lover of the writer Oscar Wilde. Much of his early poetry was Uranian in theme, though he tended, later in life, to distance himself from both Wilde's influence and his own role as a Uranian poet. more…

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