Noel

Excerpt from Noel: An Epic in Ten Cantos
What purpose has the singer in a land
When he must dwell with men who cannot hear,
And would not if they could, but in their bland
Self-righteousness assume that their own fear
Is Heaven's law, and will not understand
That life is more than Bibles, bounce and beer?
The singer has no purpose, yet he goes
Making sweet music among music's foes.
April in England! April in the woods!
Earth has no beauty half so rare as this.
O the enchantment! Here the spirit broods.
Here, half aswoon, young lovers find their kiss
Melt into pain, and, dreading their own moods,
They think the world and they are made amiss.
O! English lads and maids in their own spite
Turn with their love the spring to winter's night.
Call then the blackbird, call the willow-wren,
Call the bright robin, chiff-chaff, bullfinch, tit,
All singing birds to waken senseless men,
Dullards of England, dense and slow of wit.
Beasts and the trees have heard the call again,
But men are still impervious to it.
Look in their eyes. There is no wonder found.
Were they not better laid beneath the ground?
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