from Epitaphs

Written on a slat of a railway car:

If some time someone should find pearls

threaded on a blood-red string of silk

which, near the throat, runs all the thinner

like life’s own path until it’s gone

somewhere in a fog and can’t be seen—

If someone should find these pearls

let him know how—cool, aloof—they lit up

the eighteen-year-old, impatient heart

of the Paris dancing girl, Marie.

Now, dragged through unknown Poland—

I’m throwing my pearls through the grate.

If they’re found by a young man—

let these pearls adorn his girlfriend.

If they’re found by a girl—

let her wear them; they belong to her.

And if they’re found by an old man—

let him, for these pearls, recite a prayer.