Eclogue

[based on music of the same title by Gerald Finzi:

"Eclogue for Piano and Strings"

And, to Conrad Aiken]

looking for lost words again

I turned to find the angel-driven songs,

migrations high above our heads like a Christmas

far removed but Doppler gold

in their approaching who would

not murmur, “stay” in the instant

the heart-split garden flamed

in the eastern corners,

remembering…

where are we refined?

I turn and turn again

harp ravaged in the wilderness

and music bears me on

I don’t know how

beyond the startling phrase I almost recognize:

Mirror to mirror shining  in the flood within

the flood within the flood.

distraught are the angels, looking on, yet-

still as a pond with starlight filled, serene:

withholding rainbows till an appointed time

while I ask lowly and so out of tune

is it so much farther on?

and I am not at home

where snow forgets, it seems, forever -   to fall and cover

this tenured sorrow

that devastates that devastates

the softly flaring mind that haunts the future Spring unanchored 

still- so beautiful yet flowing on

finding no place to rest

mary angela douglas 6 october 2012