WINTER ' FOURTEEN
No, no, no. Not because I can’t –I can- but I won’t. Not now – not ever with or without its amen, amen.
Even when asked – she pleaded for this with the smell of weeds and roses about her. No, no, and no
again, now and always, for it will always be demanded of me but I will not give it.
Negation as affirmation – this is my weapon in my battles and wars though there is but one war I’m
engaged in. Old warriors I am come amongst you to be what I must and will be – your warrior-strength to
the strength of my hand nor forgetting the mind’s fortitude and aptitude for matters yet unfinished or begun.
And the sea before me, the sea behind me, the sea on my right side, the sea on my left side. The
mothering surf. From here across it yet let not your silence come upon me but wave after wave of utterance.
She also pleaded for utterance but I would not make it.
These shabby rags – inheritance and a broken pot whereas I in the cauldron will stir…
As a foretime so be it hereafter. And I will prove myself thrilling to the wind. Other lands, other tongues.
Tongues of fire to cast the earth in tongues of fire. In exile to be. From this place tonight. From the dark
and dank wood. No patria.
Yet a mind held aloft like a signalman with a lantern (he who holds up the light is the light)
Yet I see them gathered who are gathered against me. How brightly my eyes flash against them. How
even my footprints will be spoken of. How my triumphs will burn the wind! Even the sunlight will be jealous
as I outshine the dullness and sluggishness of these days. So let my pride be arrogance unto the meanness
of this town – what do I care?
They cannot abide me and I will not abide here when on the waves of the sea I will ride – see, I stride
the dolphins of my desire . Young Angus to the ancient town who will undo its culpability.
And today day zero of my calends.
Breaking all to remake all to the new delineations – see me, I am fire to old wood. For I have become
the gathering and the dispersal. Cauterising the wounds of my soul - I am wounded but not grievously so.
Nor maimed into silence where the ways of words will gather about me to goodly ends.
And flocks of twittering sparrows in my hair.
The laurel leaves already about me and glistening in the sun.
So now must I instruct a Greek dilemma to their minds – which is my Greek dilemma, and under what
stone can I place my sword? Or enter the chapel perilous with a smile on my mouth and a brash glance. Or
draw it out of stone according to the prophecy I will fulfil under this thunderous rain? (ye gods of Greece
I will accept no answer that is not my own)
See them, newly come to inquisit the air about them who do not yet flash in the sun. That out of such
formlessness I should form… - to kneel, perhaps, but in what adoration or in kneeling to espouse the counterprayer I yet might impart as has been given me by those few warriors I treasure.
Taking from the store-house but adding to the store-house like some sly prophet in the agora but not
yet the proffered chalice to my lips. More to my liking are these buds of summer as my symbol – and not
Greek but solid English as my weapon – sharpened on those stones (how the stones themselves are sharp)
like a causeway for those who are dispossessed of weeds and roses (I am so dispossessed like one with the
nudity of a god)
Nor death songs about me to the flickering of candles (espouse that my true brethren, ye few, ye fewer,
ye none, for that is and will be my true instruction my true admonishment)
Unto the beauty of which…
As is now and will be – world without to the world within.
The Linnet's Wings