58

Psychomachia:

For Dylan Thomas and All Protesters

Then how condemn the savage cry you grow,

enraged against the dying of the day

to darknesses your sun dare never know?

All outraged souls make clamor, vanish so

into that void burned in their shrinking clay;

then how condemn the savage cry you grow?

Forever circling in toward deaths ago,

each moment’s drift shouts final nay

to darknesses your sun dare never know.

The candle-light you lift can nave glow

enough to burn such fatal chill away;

then how condemn the savage cry you grow?

Cry then, poor soul, though earth fires all too slow

for kiln to permanence what fears betray

to darknesses your sun dare never know.

Man’s small light droops, its tallow melts like snow

unnoticed on midsummer’s dead midday;

then how condemn the savage cry you grow

to darknesses your sun dare never know?