Song at the Year's Turning -- R S Thomas

New Year's Day guest poem sent in by Manan

(Poem #1135) Song at the Year's Turning Shelley dreamed it. Now the dream decays. The props crumble; the familiar ways Are stale with tears trodden underfoot. The heart's flower withers at the root. Bury it then, in history's sterile dust. The slow years shall tame your tawny lust. Love deceived him; what is there to say The mind brought you by a better way To this despair? Lost in the world's wood You cannot stanch the bright menstrual blood. The earth sickens; under naked boughs The frost comes to barb your broken vows. Is there blessing? Light's peculiar grace In cold splendour robes this tortured place For strange marriage. Voices in the wind Weave a garland where a mortal sinned. Winter rots you; who is there to blame? The new grass shall purge you in its flame. -- R S Thomas

I cannot help but think of this poem every time the New Year
comes around. It's in Thomas' old style, which he later
abandoned for a more free-verse kind of approach. What
astounds me most about Thomas' poetry is his ability to
conjure up metaphors seemingly at will.
I guess I'll leave it that.

Manan.