The poem
On almost the incendiary eve Of several near deaths, When one at the great least of your best loved And always known must leave Lions and fires of his flying breath, Of your immortal friends Who'd raise the organs of the counted dust To shoot and sing your praise, One who called deepest down shall hold his peace That cannot sink or cease Endlessly to his wound In many married London's estranging grief.
On almost the incendiary eve When at your lips and keys, Locking, unlocking, the murdered strangers weave, One who is most unknown, Your polestar neighbour, sun of another street, Will dive up to his tears. He'll bathe his raining blood in the male sea Who strode for your own dead And wind his globe out of your water thread And load the throats of shells with every cry since light Flashed first across his thunderclapping eyes.
On almost the incendiary eve Of deaths and entrances, When near and strange wounded on London's waves Have sought your single grave, One enemy, of many, who knows well Your heart is luminous In the watched dark, quivering through locks and caves, Will pull the thunderbolts To shut the sun, plunge, mount your darkened keys And sear just riders back, Until that one loved least Looms the last Samson of your zodiac.
Martha Graham chose the (Title) line from this poem for the name of her ballet, "Death and Entrances" (1943). It is claimed that the ballet is about the Bronte sisters but primarily about Emily Bronte. I keep reading this poem to see if there is anything in it that might prompt Ms. Graham to connect to the Brontes. I confess, I do not see it. I wish it were otherwise.