Poetry Explorer


Classic and Contemporary Poetry


OLYMPUS by FRANK WILMOT

First Line: MITES IN YOUR BABY BATTLES SPLITTING MY CLOUDS WITH NOISE!
Last Line: COME REACHING UP FOR FORGIVENESS WITH BLOODY HANDS?

MITES in your baby battles splitting my clouds with noise!
Orgy and revel of death! Play on! Play on!
Yet none of your puny thunders disturb the mountain-poise
Where I, your God, am waiting calm and alone.

Play on! Let your flying angers quiver through tranquil light
That falls from my steadfast love on your shameless skins!
Ho! I, your God, am laughing! Beyond all vision of right,
Beyond all judgment mounteth the sum of your sins!

Play on! And splash with your blood the walls of your
darkened cities,
Batter your brains on the threshold of hell for a show.
Still I, your God, am gentle, gracious, of infinite pities,
I am unmoved, because of things that I know.

I am unmoved. Have the whirling blasts of your blasphemies stirred
The flowers on this mountain? All heaven is calm as a lake.
Tides move to the mood of my moons, dawn comes with its
heralding bird,
Faith prowls with my jungle brutes, my suns are awake.

Play on till the squandered bounties are wasted, and finally fall
My laws from your memory. Who shall replenish your lands,
Should I in my vengeance refuse your grovelling prayers when you all
Come reaching up for forgiveness with bloody hands?



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