The scop-work sings that fate goes as it must,
And it is tempting to sit back and trust
That fate will work in ways we see as just,
But Clothos has to pay for what she spins,
And Urðr does not get her weave for grins.
Greed is rightly named the root of sins,
And they are sinners all who power seek,
And all of us will suffer virtue’s leak
As it will seep away, fed by a creek
And feeding mighty rivers in its turn.
The water gone, the landscape then must burn,
A drought descending, though people for rain yearn.
And Stupid God cavorting laughs the while,
Seeing what transpires with a smile.
I have not been followed by Anything that could flee from me Driven by my backward glance Instead, when I follow Orpheus Approach the threshold of the living world What I see clings more tightly to me Swallows me more greedily than any who Have drunk the broth that I prepare Few as they have been
So inviting… Photo by Kaboompics .com on Pexels.com
They occasion no worry Being no maenads And I not mourning my wife She lives yet, and well And my hand-plucking is nothing eagerly sought But they may be dryads Their trees growing stuntedly twisted Gnarled in bark and bough from infertile soil And being watered but little And that of salty waters
No branch grows straight if tended thus No bole proud and sturdy No spirit succored from such sure And what can wizened whispers thus created do Save sing discordant hymns in despite of the gardener No more harmonious than the awkward and halting chords Fingers find upon the fretless boards Quiet voices ringing in the silence only Because they hold so closely to the ear Clinging desperately where they have held purchase Drawing darkness after them and with themselves Underworld brought over and unreleased
The threshold might as well be a wall Founded so deeply and built so high It cannot be crossed
I am far away, now, from the limestone hills of home
Where oaks and cedars, cypress and mesquite, rise from the riverbanks
Listening to the songs blown by breezes across the bass’s dwelling
Dancing in intricate rhythms of which Avie would approve
Sparkling in the night with our pale imitations of the stars above
I had thought it silly, long ago, when my voice was higher, and
I joined the warbling sopranos and altos breathing out
Their paean to the season and the city
Lookin’ for a Santa Claus down by the Guadalup’
As I and they made ready to take on spikes and four-point racks
Dolphins and mustangs and scorpions as we fancied ourselves then
Struggling to lift up our voices, light as they were,
And in later years, when I had donned the blue and gold,
Their hues changing over years to darker tones and back again,
My thoughts were darker yet amid the lights that sprang
From trees acorn-grown and steel-wrought beside the streets
Or tall beside where a fountain stood and a gazebo stands
And they stayed darker when I went away
Visiting far-off places where the languages shifted but still extolled
The season’s glories, whatever the weather
But
In later years, when I, beaten down, returned to that place where I was raised,
I found forgiveness in all the feasting, let my heart be lifted
Where once I had pushed it down, and if I struggle still to let it rise,
Ascend the old trees whose knees poke out of the current beside
A tranquil place amid the rush and flow, overlooked by learning’s shrine,
Scale the rising landscape that strives for green in every month and finds it
Under gray curtains when Aestas has fled for other lands
Only rarely hiding it under a white blanket, and less often for long,
As the old ones note who speak of such things over cups of coffee of a morning
And whose words I still hear in my heart when I think back on it all
From where I now sit, having sought greener fields for a time and found
They are not so much to my desire as my old home
To which I return as I may, less often than I might like,
In any month, but more in the old tenth when
Older, finer clothes are donned again beside the water and
By an earl that runs from north to south and
By a baker of no small renown on the state’s longest highway
I realize, perhaps not too late for me, that
It’s still a Kerrville, Hill Country Christmas that I love
And I look forward to seeing it again
Is it any wonder? Image from the City of Kerrville and so public domain
On a crystal morning when I heard the dewdrops falling Down from a gleaming heaven, it was your voice I heard calling And when I come home again from a world that’s not for me, It’s been your songs that set me free.
Hey there, violinist, I don’t ask why you had to go; I got to hear your stories, wish I could’ve seen your show, Open-eyed and laughing, but now you’ve gone away. I know none of us can stay.
Here I am, still following your sign, Listening closely, hearing things align. I am still here, and you’re not there, But your song’s still ringing through the air.
I could ask, o, singer, what it’s like to be so old, See the summers passing and the winters growing cold While your body’s failing you, though your soul feels new, But that, I can never do.
Here I am, still following your sign, Listening closely, hearing things align. I am still here, and you’re not there, But your song’s still ringing through the air.
It’s no simple thing, seeing through the eyes Of belov’d artists and to their works reprise; They e’er remain, they’re always standing there, And their works, still miracles found everywhere.
You sang your songs to many, and many long years ago, And I, eager, listen, though I know you’ll never know Now, beyond the sunset, as our lives must ever trend; Sometime, every song must end.
Here I am; I listen for a sign, Hear the song again, know things will be fine, Though I’m still here, and you’re not there. Your song’s still ringing through the air.
Elliott RWI 