LAMENTATION
(IN THE SIGHTLESS FOG OF MORNING)
A phellêaist fy eniad oddi wrth heddwch.
A bright white fog is on the morning air.
I will find me a chapel where prayers still hang
As fine as dew-drenched cobwebs on these tall spear thistles.
For the land is broken and only kind words will do.
And the demons are dispossessed and disconsolate,
Outdone and made redundant. The herds of angels
Moo and milk their holy audience for praise.
We are lost. Babylon has fallen, and risen, and fallen into dust.
Proud men of science are peddling their religion,
More vehement than priests. The holy words
Are locusts that eat the grain of our own children.
The Chosen have chosen themselves, pushed
To the front of the queue, happy to now be
In fields of blood and dust and phosphoric rubble.
The cities have fallen. Some in an instant,
Some in slow motion, like ballerinas, knowing
Neither poison nor antidote.
Wailing and lamentation would be some relief
But the clamour of self-congratulatory rhetoric
Cascades with the dignity of football rattles,
Drowning out the rivers that run thin and low
Of sense and foresight.
We are as lost and drained among the cold lidless stars,
Skin burning still with the heat of a midday sun
That shall never be extinguished,
Not in our heart, not in our soul.
A dark mind and sleep is all the dead wish for,
(And their names to be somehow scented
With flowers, and forgiven not forgotten.)
But beneath the earth the giants rise up
Simple and good in their lack of intellect,
And unknowing crush another civilisation,
Bury another bright dawn, the highways broken and empty.
Birdsong silent, then cautious, then glorious.
There will be an end to us,
And goodness shall surely follow.
Am hyn yr ydwyfyn wylo; y mae fy llygad, fy llygad yn rhedeg gan ddwfr
—-
Translation of the Welsh from Lamentations of Jeremiah:
“And thou hast removed my soul far off from peace”
“for these things I weep; mine eye, mine eye runneth down with water”
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simonhlilly 