Disillusionment of Ten O’clock

By Wallace Stevens

The houses are haunted

By white night-gowns.

None are green,

Or purple with green rings,

Or green with yellow rings,

Or yellow with blue rings.

None of them are strange,

With socks of lace

And beaded ceintures.

People are not going

To dreams of baboons and periwinkles.

Only, here and there, an old sailor

Drunk and asleep in his boots,

Catches Tigers

In red weather.

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