Sunday, November 16, 2008

Elegy

In the forest I found a holly tree
and thought of you

studded with red berries so early
a cold winter is coming

I wondered if you knew
anything at all as you lay

dying in your cot all seventeen
months of you a bruising

whatever nailed you to life
gave up the ghost

I found also a bed of bracken
piled on a makeshift manger

too late and far from you
but these I bring for you

the holly berry and the manger
pray for us

6 comments:

Pants said...

Hi Signs

You've snuck out of the wardrobe. Lovely poem - thanks for the glimpse.

xxx

Pants

Cusp said...

Poor little mite.....what a touching tribute. Too bad all the caring and concern that's about now wasn't able to reach him before the whole deal went bad. Pray indeed

Collin Kelley said...

Beautifully melancholy. Hope all is well in that Tardis-like wardrobe.

Unknown said...

Strange that the saddest of events can spur us to write something so beautiful. Thanks, Signs, beauty out of horror.

Montag said...

Just stopped by to thank you for the Celan poem, Tenebrae.
It was a wonderfully shocking experience.

I cannot convey to you how amazed I was to see a poetry bloom again after the winter of the Holocaust.

I mean that I had known of all the things involved before: Holocaust, poetry, religious imagery etc., but never before had they been so intimate with each other in my awareness...

...and so it seems that this poem you have written is a similar resurrection...and it strange that beauty comes from sadness.

I guess this hints at the power of Irony that shapes our awareness of the world: even death is suddenly reversed into life!

There is a lot here, and I shall think about it.
Thank you again.

Reading the Signs said...

Thank you for the responses, good people.

The sadness of situations such as the child endured is really beyond words.