You Give Short Shrift To The Swan Decked Page

(in sorrow, for the Romantic poets of the past;in hope,

they will return after their banishment by the minimalists)

you give short shrift to the swan decked page,

no quarter at all

to the glittering once upons

and sell your souls for political rage

I cannot love you post modern age

yet can I weep because your sleep is dreamless

and you like it that way.

past music bores you

that shook the stars

and if you go to Mars

you worship the trajectory

the machines that got you there

and not the God who placed in Space

the floating mysteries of so many torches

to light, tenderly, your oblivious way.

what have you got to say for yourselves

for decimating the majesty of poetry

and turning it into one long whine

at the cleverness of all mankind

or at how you were left behind, despondent.

isn't that the greatest crime

of rampant celebrity. darlings,

moonlight seems wasted on you

the song of birds on the bed of pain

how much more could you disdain;

the beaded curtains of the rain

God save you from the paradise you'll make,

have made before

relegating beauty to a foreign post, and shoreless-

breaking  the heart of the Holy Ghost.

Shekinah! the glory of God.

mary angela douglas 15 december 2021;29 january 2022