THE DECLINE OF MODERN POETRY: THE WANING OF THE LIGHT

 (to the poet of "The Dream Of the Rood", and to Christ, the Lord)

I saw the dream rood bartered bargained away

sad sad the day this befell the poem of all poems foremost

glittering reprieved from anguish now but not on earth,

the Jeweled Tree no longer biding, banished was the Word

and thus had poetry become instead the dire dearth, sting

of looking into the mirrors where all wings fled

where the Word had bled since infancy

but no more

and transcribing what was seen then

seas with no shore

in the most menial of ways day labouring

for the gift freely given, granted blotted out

by the candleless seizing power

so had we come to live in the slanted worlds

the selfsame hour

o bitter occlusion then, world without music

the Tree of Light is felled

so light loses everything forgetting its Origins

and Poetry,

the springtide of its days, the Pearl of language

hurled and trundled away

so men came to control

the empires of song, the optics, every ray

and made it wrong o the greatest grievous wrong

to praise Thee;to whisper even on the lifting, the lilting,

the lilied breezes Thy Name.

mary angela douglas 16 may 2021

1Mary Angela Douglas