Nocturnal Vespers


It's not like one has to wait a long time
to see what people are really like when
removed from the ostentation of view
if some bells of truth may yet ring and chime
and nudity still tingles th' flesh anew.

All is even when fallen in slumber.
The king's commands blow not on ears deafened
by the higher power's will to give rest
to all the mortal souls as one number
a kindly pause from the eternal test.

The night is more than an absence of light.
A seeping substance uncoils released when
like ink vapours that make the grey dark shade
between the twinklings and the full moon bright
an occult fog clasps as the senses fade.

The surreptitious bard with a spray can
looking for places to lay thick his wrath
but somewhat afraid of unconsciousness
he prowls the caverns of man's darkened plan
to "psst" in the ears of his holiness.

The insomniac priest with a runny nose
sits and wonders about his television
set of pictures for the hapless heathen
flowing all the night from an electric hose
into the brain of a saintly brethren.

By fusing miracles we all were made
incidental mites of nature's clamour
claiming legal rights to intelligence
a gift for which the ordained clerics prayed
nocturnal vespers hushed in deference.

The energy of the humanist wit
may yet transform the unyielding machine
into a maker of butterfly wings,
but will that hint the waking hour permit
inside the drowning drone that dawning brings?

Lucignano, 12 April 2006