Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, ADVENT, by HOWARD MCKINLEY CORNING



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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

ADVENT, by                    
First Line: Last night / the shrill-voiced hounds of march
Last Line: Walk with tomorrow.
Subject(s): Spring; Winter


Last night
The shrill-voiced hounds of March
Went baying the white wolves of Winter
Back into the deep hills,
And this morning a white fog of herons rose from the black marshes
Like dreams over sleep.
The muted lakes broke their icy drum-heads and turned again to dancing;
While everywhere
The jeweled daggers of the sun rent in twain
The silver vestments of the frost.
Sleep is a broken vessel!

Out of the prostrate arms of the soil
Spring, like a maiden, comes leaping and racing.
She combs her hair with the wind
And flings from her hands the coin of tears;
In her eyes is the smoke of violets,
And on her breath the warm musk of earth.
Her thighs are girded with the beauty of promise
And her vesture is garlanded flowers.
But she comes not alone as a singing maiden
With birds' nests in her hair;
Spring is a memory -- and a vision.
Women stand at the door with hands in their aprons,
Aching for the fruits of promise
And the chansons of peace.
They look long at greening fields
And regather the harvests of Yesterday --
Beauty, Peace and Remembrance.
They watch the ways of returning birds
And draw with them arcs across Time,
Their silver wings catching the light of Tomorrow.
In the moist yard, with unmittened fingers,
Winter-freed children
Rake from beneath budding hedgerows
The black, rotted leaves of Autumn --
The ungathered harvests of sleep.

I will go to the highest hill and stand in the coiffeur of the wind.
I will catch in my upturned palms
The coin of the rain,
The golden coppers of the sun,
And the fluted daisies of the stars.
I will twine them in wreaths for the remembrance of song
And the forgetfulness of death.
I will throw them over the arms of trees,
Over the hedge-rows that run to the morning,
Over old gardens that gather the past like forgotten cities.
I will strew them in the way of the children of Time,
To be hoarded in podded coffers for tomorrow's re-creation,
And against that no more going back.
I will deck myself with the earth's lavishment,
And my heart with the wonder of waiting,
And hand in hand with the children of morning
Climb the high zenith of accomplished moments.
I will stand on the pedestal of the sun
And trace an inscription on receding night,
While its cohorts fade beyond the flare of advancing banners.

We will lift our hands in adoration and invocation
To the God of all sowings
And all re-incarnations.
We will lift our voices with the wind's trumpeting
And the clarion of departing moments.
We will walk with lifted hearts into advancing days
While earth blossoms
And we sing. . . .

They who walk with Spring
Walk with tomorrow.





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