Gustav Richter

After a long day of work in my hot - houses         Sleep was sweet, but if you sleep on your left side         Your dreams may be abruptly ended.         I was among my flowers where some one         Seemed to be raising them on trial,         As if after-while to be transplanted         To a larger garden of freer air.         And I was disembodied vision         Amid a light, as it were the sun         Had floated in and touched the roof of glass         Like a toy balloon and softly bursted,         And etherealized in golden air.         And all was silence, except the splendor         Was immanent with thought as clear         As a speaking voice, and I, as thought,         Could hear a         Presence think as he walked         Between the boxes pinching off leaves,         Looking for bugs and noting values,         With an eye that saw it all:         "Homer, oh yes! Pericles, good.         Caesar Borgia, what shall be done with it?         Dante, too much manure, perhaps.         Napoleon, leave him awhile as yet.         Shelley, more soil.    Shakespeare, needs spraying - "         Clouds, eh! -