by john clare
We were never the poets we thought,
It's uncertain any words ever fell in place.
With each using of one, another went to waste,
The discarded word then vainly sought.
I sat beside a flower with my pen,
What words I knew I used.
Carefully composing the words I chose,
Like plucking choice gold leaves from fall winds.
A sulphur lit and to her I rhymed,
To me it was quite an event.
It was beyond any word written,
Poetical as Frost's best lines.
Then the Cranes came upon the breeze,
That sound from beyond time.
In itself a gathering of Nature's rhyme,
Each composing upon paper blue sky effortlessly.
It was then an order became evident,
I was freed from finding the rhyme,
Of trying to compose within the lines,
Before me rose a curtain un-rent.
The scene I saw was of threaded light,
We simply pull the needle slowly to see,
Only the light flecks this side of the tapestry,
Backing black yet necessary to see the
other side wedding white.
We are to give sound to the unheard,
Not mere poets but translators and scribes,
Preserving in word His light coursing ride,
Touching you, me, cloud, bee and bird.
