Jul 2, 2014

Reynolds and Midway 46



          KING
          Thanks, Rosencrantz and gentle Guildenstern.
          QUEEN
          Thanks, Guildenstern and gentle Rosencrantz.


"Sie ist der hellste Stern von allen, hier
kommt die Sonne..." hier I sit again—
tambien y Also, not as in as well,
but so , or thus, as in Herr Nietzsche's Buch
and Strauss's tondichtung, and not that Strauss
who made The Blue Danube, but Richard, he
who hymnd w his triumphant brass and chords
the Cosmos ere that cinematic wizard
Kubrick borrowd them and also made
those notes Eternal— Sing, then, muse of song,
Apollo, he whose son usurped the reins
and drove the sun across the vaulted dome
that spans the Earth, like Icarus, whose father
watchd him fashion wings: both vainly fell
for their ambition, like that fiend of old,
the brightest angel Lucifer, by Milton
glorified who told in his 12 books
of that archangel's ancient hate and fall
with his one third the populous of Heaven,
who warrd with monumental engines, strove
with futile energy and negative power
against the greater Seraphim and hosts
immeasurable, when One born in the Light
and coeternal with the Lord enthroned,
greater than Michael, mightiest of angels,
Him to be brought low and born of woman
in Bethlehem, that tender Nazarene
Who wanderd weakend in the flesh of men,
constraind to poverty and mildest temper,
Who, puissant on high and formed of might,
drove Satan and his hosts to depths of woe
and dark regret: Like that, he sd, and I:
There is a painting of young Phaethon
downtumbling from the sky, by Johann Liss,
and flabby bodies, nigh on corpulent,
watching in terror and astonishment.
Better the scene envisiond by Brueghel
and later immortalized by Wystan Hugh,
of Icarus, an object in the distance;
better that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern
should move to center stage and Hamlet brood
alone in wafty castle corridors.
But wherefor, is the question Reynolds puts,
and Midway: Few get saccharine violins
and windy music as the credits roll,
as teary-eyed invigorated viewers
rise and, clutching empty popcorn boxes,
walk the graded carpet to the square
of light that takes them back under the sun
and to the ordinary. Many pine
and everything goes foul; and every day
a question forms its curved, quizzical mark
in that Platonic plane where Absolutes
exist unquestionably and absolutely,
of that material of which the World
is made, or should we say, is in the making,
the Light, the Waters, and the Firmament,
and all that creepeth on the field One made
Who knows the field and Is its Knower, One
Who sees the salamander in the ground
beneath the stones we overturnd, the cool
wet soil where wiggld worms, where went
the multipedald centipede and ant,
Also observed and numberd, as the hairs
upon our heads, so warnd the lamblike Christ
Who was His Father's embassy on Earth—
O Word made flesh, Who also sees the scales
of fish flash in the Waters, and the spume
of whales, Who walkd the lake of Galilee,
and in the garden of Gethsemane
cried on the Father, Abba, Adonai,
and chastend Peter, who denied him thrice,
and, kissd by Judas, went to pay the price
of our salvation, bound, a criminal,
spat on and scourgd. O Lord, my Saviour, Christ,
let me be chastend also, make me love
all those that hate me, let me speak of them
who in this minute, while my fingers move,
are trappd in desperation's snares, whose hearts
have not Thee, who are in despair, whom hope
has left, who wear the woven shoes of Sorrow,
who go w soundless and w sudden feet
and over Goldengrove unleaving mourn
and live in darkness. Grant these, Lord, Thy light
and gentle hand, in Thee reborn.


7.2.14

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