The High Days
Great cliffs with deserts at their bottoms mark
The years. Each steep descent goes straight to plains
Strewn out as sand, and drearinesses arc
Out flatter than the rocks of numbness. Pain
Would be too much to ask. Boringness spreads
Out, wide before us and around us. Weeds
Might even be a slight relief or shreds
Of threat, but these are withheld from our needs.
These special days are like escarpments on
One side — but when they end, a bleakness sprawls
Before us. What is left when joy has gone
Is lunar surface. Stone greyness appals.
The singing in mediǽval choirs shrinks slim
And candles glimmer, disappointed, dim.