Country Pleasures

I wonder by my troth, what thou and I

Did, till we lov’d? Were we not wean’d till then?

But suck’d on country pleasures, childlishly?

— JOHN DONNE

Here at the last cold Pharos between Greece

And all I love, the lights confide

A deeper darkness to the rubbing tide;

Doors shut, and we the living are locked inside

Between the shadows and the thoughts of peace:

And so in furnished rooms revise

The index of our lovers and our friends

From gestures possibly forgotten, but the ends

Of longings like unconnected nerves,

And in this quiet rehearsal of their acts

We dream of them and cherish them as Facts.

— LAWRENCE DURRELL