Peter
Sacks
HYMN FOR THE NEW YEAR
The end of our own century,
headless angels flailing the yard,
the final spasm of their wings
caught in the slow red crystal of eternity.
Neither tears nor blood alone,
the echo of their last song
Not for our sakes
but
your own
still moistening the shade in which we shelter
reaching this time for the fat black hen,
its feathers fouled with panic,
answering,
This too was given,
for our earthly hunger.
Like the cleansing water and the fire,
the tree of which we made
this level stump,
and iron for the blade.
