I had forgotten
the old quest for truth
I was here for Other cares
held me: urgencies
of the body; a girl
beckoned; money
had never appeared
so ethereal; it was God's blood
circulating in the veins
of creation; I partook
of it like Communion, lost
myself on my way
home, with the varying voices
on call. Moving backward
into a receding
future, I lost the use
of perspective, borrowing poetry
to buy my children
their purpose. The past was a poor
king, rendering his crown down
for the historian. Every day
I went on with that
metallic warfare in which
the one casualty is love.
by R. S. Thomas
from Laboratories of the Spirit (1975)
Advertisements
