There is no strength in stone

Running rest-day ...

... no obvious date on this little (pictured) volume, which does have an 'old money' price: I think it's from around 1948/49?

Anyhow, here's my favourite verse from within:


WINTER NIGHT

There is no substance in the falling night,
In our cold bodies, in our frost-chilled breath,
In the grey geese above, whose phantom flight
Spans the dim wastes of marsh-land dreariness.

Then brittle grows the moon. The stars are glass;
Their scattered fragments flash and scintillate,
And slowly, in an awesome order pass
Across the shining realms of boundless pace.

Tall stands the Norman church. Its silhouette
Is paper-thin against the sparkling sheen,
And belfry-tower, the roofs, and louvres are set
Like contours pencilled on a silver screen.

There is no strength in stone; its power has fled,
All bulk dissolves before night's witchery.
The buttressed wall, its frosted spider-web
Wear for an hour the same fragility.