Well *that* was dispiriting...
When the going gets tough, the tough
reach for a volume of poetry. Also for a tall frosty.
Shine, Perishing
Republic
While this America settles
in the mould of its vulgarity, heavily thickening
to empire
And protest, only a bubble in the molten mass,
pops and sighs out, and the
mass hardens,
I sadly smiling remember that the flower fades
to make fruit, the fruit rots
to make
earth.
Out of the mother; and through the
spring exultances, ripeness and decadence;
and home to the mother.
You making haste
haste on decay: not blameworthy; life is good, be it stubbornly
long or suddenly
A mortal splendor: meteors are not needed less
than mountains:
shine, perishing republic.
But for my children, I would have them keep
their distance from the
thickening center;
corruption
Never has been compulsory, when the
cities lie at the monster's feet there
are
left the mountains.
And boys, be in
nothing so moderate as in love of man, a clever servant,
insufferable master.
There is the trap that catches noblest
spirits, that caught—they say—
God, when he walked on
earth
—Robinson Jeffers,
1926
Posted: Wed - November 3, 2004 at 06:22 PM