A graveyard for the West

A reflective poem

Stepping out, Wise traveller

See waves and winds and leaves

Autumn's fare

Dissolve, tranquil,

Into the vortical sky.

 

Walking under banners, fair stranger

See a sky beset with flags

That flutter, springtime blossom

Like the cherrytrees of your home.

 

Reaching the sea, beautiful friend

Let the salt-surf lay siege

To your pale, creased hand

Outstretched

A storm comes from the East

To ask you where your home is.

 

Olive-scent Summer, noble ghost

Wafts funereal mothwings

Fluttering, crying for whitecapped

Mountains where you grew

And glades whose roots dig

Nourished by the ashes of your Fathers.

 

There are no mountains

And no streams to bear the stream-boats

And no sailors to take the papyrus-word

Now the storms and the many winds

Have changed the world you knew

How, like the seasons, you

Never know what shape to call

Today's world;

Now the wildcat takes open strides

The wolf cries in the peaks that were

And you, frightened child

Will find the home that never was.