And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before
The Tavern shouted – “Open then the Door!
You know how little time we have to stay,
And once departed, may return no more.”
Alike for those who for TO-DAY prepare,
And that after a TO-MORROW stare,
A Muezzin from the Tower of Darkness cries
“Fools! your reward is neither Here nor There!”
Why, all the Saints and Sages who discuss’d
Of the Two Worlds so learnedly, are thrust
Like foolish Prophets forth; their Words to Scorn
Are scatter’d, and their mouths are stopt with Dust.
Oh, come with old Khayyam, and leave the Wise
To talk; one thing is certain, that Life flies;
One thing is certain, and the Rest is Lies;
The Flower that once has blown for ever dies.
Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Doctor and Saint, and heard great Argument
About it and about: but evermore
Came out of the same Door as I went.
With them the Seed of Wisdom did I sow,
And with my own hand labour’d it to grow:
And this was all the Harvest that I reap’d -
“I came like Water, and like Wind I go.”
Into this Universe, and why not knowing,
Nor whence, like Water willy-nilly flowing:
And out of it, as Wind along the Waste,
I know not whither, willy-nilly blowing.
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.
And that inverted Bowl we call The Sky,
Whereunder crawling coop’t we live and die,
Lift not thy hands to It for help – for It
Rolls impotently on as Thou or I.
Inspired by James’ posting of a lot of his writings:
This is the only one of my poems that I can remember. This isn’t all of it, but it’s most of it. There are two couplets and another sentence missing. It would flow MUCH better if I could think of the rest of it. It’s from the era when I was doing a lot of “found” poetry – i.e. pulling lines from various sources and assembling them together to make a poem.
The rest of my poetry – all of my early writing, in fact – is lost. It’s at mother’s in a box.
The lines are all from chapter 3 of “White Oleander,” which isn’t worth reading if you’ve never read it. It’s fucked-up chick lit about a girl who is caught up in the foster care system in California because her mother kills someone (the “Barry” named below). She gets into drugs, prostitution, and all kinds of fucked up things.
Yeah. This is the kind of book I was reading when I was 12.
–
A demure, braided Gretel
Thinking about beauty and fate
Poppies bleed petals of sheer excess
You and I, this sweet battleground
Wear your love like heaven
Peacock voices crying, “Barry!”
A room of my own
Subtle and nameless
Skeleton rattlings of wind in the palms
“You’re not my type,”
I said coolly into the rearview mirror
She’s not as pretty as you
But she’s a simpler girl
THAT is no country for old men. The young
In one another’s arms, birds in the trees
- Those dying generations – at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.
An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.
O sages standing in God’s holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.
