POETRY
THE SILENCE ANSWERED HIM ACCUSINGLY
"Don't fool yourself," the silence said to me,
"Don't tell yourself a noble lie once more!"
Then to the silence, being accused, I said:
"I teach the boys and the girls in my ageing youth,
I
try
to tell them the little I know of truth,
Saying, In the beginning is the word,
And in the end and everywhere
in
love,
In all love's places and in the mind of God.
Three words I speak, though they are bare and far,
untouchable as a star,
The true, the good, and the beatttiful,
Shifting my tones as if I said to them
Candy, soda, fruits and flowers,
And
if
they hear what thunderclap uproars,
unanimous applause,
(Extremely gratifying signs of pleasure) .
'Behold the unspeakable beauty,' I say to them,
'Arise and lift your eyes and raise your hearts
In celebration and in praise because
Plato's starlight glitters amid the shocking wars.' "
SUCH ANSWERS ARE COLD COMFORT TO THE DEAD
"What empty rhetoric," the silence said,
"You teach the boys and girls that you may gain
The bread and wine which sensuality
Sues like a premier or a president.
These are illusions of your sense of guilt
Which shames you like a vain lie when revealed.
The other boys slumped like sacks on desperate shores.''
"But well you know the life which I have lived,
Cut off, in truth, by all that I have been
From the normal pleasures of the citizen.
How often in the midnight street I passed
The party where the tin horns blew contempt
And the rich laughter rose as midnight struck,
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