WHY SHOULD THESE EFFIGIES TROUBLE THE HEART

 

WHY SHOULD THESE EFFIGIES TROUBLE THE HEART

Why should these effigies trouble the heart

These soft blue field Madonnas

I was asked in a dream where angels stood mute

And Rilke stood apart

With the stars as witnesses

Who will dare to judge the clouds of Van Gogh

The pinwheels of his stars

When art has laid down its palette at last

And men have begun truly to die

Without beauty how can we live

Whisper her orphaned children on the peppermint wind

Or they would if they could, and leave off playing hopscotch

On the rain smattered pavements forever subject to

Poorer kingdoms where

That wind blows only listlessly over

The brown curled leaves on the desultory pavements.

And poetry is remembered if at all

as just a moon drenched phase

we once went through.

mary angela douglas 30 may 2024