574 / 676
574
ROBERT lOWELL
CLERGYMAN
The wind has died.
ROBIN
What are you doing?
CLERGYMAN
ROBIN
I'm playing with this whirligig,
and waiting to see which way the wind
will veer. It's quite amusing, Son,
trying to guess the whims of the wind.
I am waiting for a sign.
A strange thing for a modern churchman.
My father says the Church
is
a rock.
CLERGYMAN
ROBIN
Even a rock needs eyes. That's why
I shut my eyes in troubled times,
the spirit blows and no one sees it.
I see my father. He's the Deerfield
minister and Church of England.
You remind me of my father.
CLERGYMAN
ROBIN
Be careful, Son. Call no man father:
that's what we tell the Roman clergy;
sometimes I think we go too far,
they get their people out for Mass.
Help me, Father. When I shut
my eyes, I dream I'm back in Deerfield.
The people sit in rows below
the old oak; a horseman stops to water
his horse and to refresh his soul.
I hear my father holding forth
thanksgiving, hope and
all
the mercies–
but there's a faltering in his voice,
he's speaking of the absent one.
My sister's weeping, now she hides
her eyes behind a branch.