The Ardor for Order

 [Poetry], The Sword Inside  Comments Off on The Ardor for Order
Aug 292011

Once I was happy just
To flabbergast and gust
Over incestuous Thanatos and Eros,
My impulsive pair of heroes.

But now my erring mind
(Arranging, jury-rigging jigsaws night by night)
Surveys the surrounding social scene
In meditative fright.

The president imposes order,
The pope imposes hope;
Which one has the right to expedite
My sonnets with his ardor? 

Every rhyme with law and order
Is enticingly narcotic,
But to impose them on the Zeitgeist
Is damnably neurotic.

The windbag of a fascist
Hoots and emotes in Life's emporium,
His whistlework's that of the serious artist,
Envowelling society's consortium.

His graves are all so neatly done
They lie down in counted rows;
The bones obey coordinates;
Above, there blooms a rose.

I conceive a magic bag
That holds us all together,
Or perhaps simply the spurious
Convention of "the weather."

There's no God, or need be none
(Intrusive into our intimate "Scene A")
Who's got to plod, or descend
Deus ex machina.

Draw instead in dreamy eye or fable
Something constellationish
Shared with elbows tucked at table,
A grace passed round or handed down,

The substance of a wish.