A EULOGY FOR LI - PO

A EULOGY FOR LI-PO

"Why is the sea king of a hundred streams?
Because it lies below them.
Therefore it is the king of a hundred streams."
LAO TZU, TAO TE CHING

What's left of those long, honoured lines,
those proud, most powerful potentates
of ancient days?
Those ruthless rulers of the flower realm?

Time's swept their fame and might aside,
like lost leaves in dry, autumn wind.

Where are the gleaming courts,
the glittering displays,
the chambers of the slender concubines,
the shining weapons of the warriors,
the scrolls of ever-honoured names?

Dust of the dust of the driest of plains.

And we, whose childhood's history
is from the farthest reaches
of your most distant skyline's
dusk-golden vanishing of sun,
don't even know those rulers' names;
we cannot speak the singing signs.
I first came on the might of dynasties,
as footnotes to the poets.

And since the great march of the peasants,
even the proud, jade emperor of heaven
is cloud-bound, whereabouts unknown.

But you, illustrious Li-Po,
your spirit's working lives on, for
your quiet thoughts at night,
your silent, lunar light,
your cloudy mountain paths,
far waterfalls and swirling mists
and journeys of the secret soul
in far, far, upward flight,
are supple with humanity,
and sing in universal keys,
through carefully translating art,
within the hearing of the heart.

No petty emperor could claim
such a travelled, shining fame.

Thus from another land,
another time,
I raise salute
across the distances of seas and centuries.

Li-Po, you were right to call
the ones above your kin,
immortal of heaven as maker of song,
your body like enchanted breath-

still shimmering.

ROYAL LIGHT

ROYAL LIGHT

Jupiter- holy, far thunderer,
royally known as the mightiest,
glowing, sun-following world; o, your
Jovian roll through the star-glowing
home of all vastness that's over us
holds all the closer, small worlds within;
royal, vast voyager over us;
old overlord of immortal gods.

Holding your court with your following:
multi-mooned retinue, mirroring
Sol's larger family, Globe of Zeus,
o, you're enfolded by whirlwind's flow:
girded by storm; swirling, thundering,
ever unrolling, all endlessly
ever revolving; transforming with
flowing, forever repatterning.

Golden and glowing, more glorious,
brighter than most of the wanderers
in the dark dome of the evening,
to our beholding you seem a calm,
gold-yellow starpoint, unfolding your
shining far over the other worlds,
over them all like a royal; great
lord of night's violet abode.

TO THE EARLIEST WANDERER

TO THE EARLIEST WANDERER

Starlike gleam in sunset, you
Cleave sky-scene of dusk deep-blue
With your beams of keen, clear light,
Otherworldly sheen of white,
Leading like a secret guide,
After seeing day has died.

Oh, shimmering, quicksilver drop
In ether seas of evening,
You’re swift to shine, first-gleaming dot
In night’s sky-patterned glimmering-
Clear, fresh and free, unlike the bright
Somnambulistic, lunar light.

Oh, herald star of morning, you
Cleave dawn’s first screen of gleaming blue,
When, at other times, you are
Leaving night’s last-gleaming star.

TO THE FAR WANDERER

TO THE FAR WANDERER

In the room of night
I have viewed you often;
light-hued jewel,
distant wanderer,
ancient Saturn,
Chronus,
youngest born of vast Uranus,
Uranus, the limitless blue.

Remembering time's changes,
reviewing time's renewing-
the billion-beinged movement through
the deep and blue-dim days.

Far one,
ringed in huge perfection,
ruling beyond even Jupiter's bounds,
far from the sun's illumining:

singing where all is mystery,

far wanderer,
ancient Saturn,
grave timegod, Chronus,
born of the limitless
room of the sky.

TO THE SUN'S NEAREST ONE

TO THE SUN’S NEAREST ONE

You far, fast-fleeing one,
dusk-harboured star, you run
around the vast sun heart;
you pass upon your path
about that wonder blaze.
But for us you are
just a far, white star
in darkening, last dusky haze.

The sun’s shafts blast your skin;
Its stark flame fills your sky.
Such heat and glare from its vast heart!
You face the fire, tiny star.

And is it as it is for us
when we first are
enlightened by bright thinking’s spark?

When first our flaring heart
sounds passion’s thunder?

When we first start
to grasp
the world’s mind-dazzling wonder?