The Seed and the Soil

April dusk
It is tragic to be a poet now
And not a lover
Paradised under the mutest bough.

God's blessing on all who listen to me,
To all who listen. But to
Closed ears be an Orange drum
A beating and what falls due
To fools in the Kingdom Come.

I stand to night
Leg-deep in ripened white
Grasses that excite
Slow fires of mind.

And blind
Bat-winged I rise - 
A bat - 
Where little star-eyes
Round gables peer
For wondering at.

We drift and we care not whither,
Why should we care?
For You are at the end of all journeys
By vision or prayer.

His cursing lips are thin
And white as tin

His eyes are old as age
He is the Devils sage

His legs are bowed
Upon the world's road

And yet he can
Proclaim himself a man.

From your wine-cask I fill
My glass again
And I will drink to all
Unhappy men.

And now close all books
Of piety and knowledge
It is a little thing that one can learn
In Rhymers' College.

I do not know what you are
Angel or demon
Wise men have invented names for you
Out of the happiness you bestowed
Where you stayed
Was life smooth as Death's peace
And gay as a childs praying.

My fathers were a temple in the deep
Hill-secrecies where I to day roll blindly
The masonry of my generations
Has taken not kindly
To air and pick of time
I roll upon the ridge of tribulations
And the bulls paw the wind
Where once was rhyme and chime

A furrow is the string by which
The Destinies draw up the coach of fate
O furrowed field, who shall ditch
Dawn-headlands and leave no open gate.