ETERNITY IN A WING FLASH OF TIME

ETERNITY IN A WING FLASH OF TIME

Eternity in a wing flash of time, touch

people’s hearts as if there were a housewell

in every drop of rain, in every tear

frozen on the moon, a sea of tranquillity,

an elixir for a thousand ills, in every eye

more sky than a bird could ever fly out of

or a star see to the end of. Silence

should leave its fingerprint on the lips

of a rose, no, not should, but sometimes does

when one word by itself would make

a racket even the dead couldn’t blend with

like the white noise of languorous bees

on a purple afternoon when the trees

are steeping in sunlight. Full measure

and the world beside. Let it slide

from your hand like a ring you dropped

into the theatrical hat of a street musician.

Immensify your deepest intimacies

with metaphors that identify with everything

like a bridge with its reflection

in the mindstream that even when the stillness

of the moon is upon it like a swan

in Renaissance luxury, or the face

of someone blind lips could read

by the light of their eyes, flows

as if there were no abiding place

for time or life, love or art to rest in.

No ventriloquist of suffering, shriek

in your own voice, cry with your own eyes,

and if heaven mends what hell slashed open

like a loveletter meant for someone else,

don’t shrug it off as if one wound fits all,

or eat your agony as if it would do anyone else

any good to digest what can only nourish you

like milkweed suckles Monarchs, or spit it out

as if you had an antagonistic mouth

with intolerant taste-buds. Let it kill you

beautifully like a matador gored by a rose,

a scarf of blood in the eyeless sand as a sign

from a dark lady she was a nocturnal mirage.

And whether it was a tragedy or a black farce

conduct yourself accordingly like a new moon

on a widow walk devoted to waiting for someone

who’s never coming back. Uphold the integrity

of the emptiness within you like a deathbed

you’re never going to dream in again.

It’s the canvas, not the master, that’s the recipient

of beauty and the truth’s not much of a consolation

for the lost delight you laboured so arduously for,

but don’t indict the medium because the message

wasn’t for you. Life is not a reward. Death

isn’t a punishment. Whatever you’ve been convicted of.

The mind is an artist. Able to paint the worlds.

With love. In starmud. In eyes you boil

like the phlegm of snails for their purpureal irises,

or the lustre of old brass moondogs gingering the clouds.

PATRICK WHITE