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White Ash

THERE is a woman on Michigan Boulevard keeps a parrot and goldfish and two white mice.

She used to keep a houseful of girls in kimonos and three pushbuttons on the front door.

Now she is alone with a parrot and goldfish and two white mice ... but these are some of her thoughts:

The love of a soldier on furlough or a sailor on shore leave burns with a bonfire red and saffron.

The love of an emigrant workman whose wife is a thousand miles away burns with a blue smoke.

The love of a young man whose sweetheart married an older man for money burns with a sputtering uncertain flame.

And there is a love ... one in a thousand ... burns clean and is gone leaving a white ash....

And this is a thought she never explains to the parrot and goldfish and two white mice.

Written by
Carl Sandburg
1878-1967 / Male / American
Lines·Words
15·149
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