A Hard Death

God is hidden in all the veils of evil

in order that he may overcome them

all.

Right dear in the sight of the Lord

Is the death of his saints:

The death-and the dying,

And even, yes, death in such wise

In long hours of extenuation

At the uttermost ebb.

Right dear in his sight:

Maintain, maintain this scandal

And be instructed by unreason.

The ruin in nature

Proffers auguries.

In our sight the protracted throes,

The transes of dissolution,

The passage through the rough jaws,

The lot and necessity of the mortal

That was and is and is not.

The grass withereth, the flower fadeth.

In our sight the torn fibres

And sunderings,

Dread at the brink

And stupor at the unknown,

Creaturely

Benightedness of the living.

In our sight, law

Mindless and immitigable,

The machinery of the natural cycle.

O lion limb against me,

Insensate stifler.

Accept no mitigation

But be instructed at the null point;

The zero

Breeds new algebras.

Warp of the loom,

Death waits not on dying

But conspires with both our ripeness

And our taking-off;

Colors the flower

As it wastes the fruit.

Nescience is in our knowing

As eternity in the heart.

Accept no mitigation,

Refuse all sleek ensolacings:

The harshest mother is the most fecund.

A savage assuagement cries

With a savage voice.

The null point

Breeds new algebras,

The ruin in nature

Proffers auguries.

This hammer

Strikes sparks from the heart,

The double-axe has its fulgurations.

Death like a dam

Arouses the deep;

Off the Big Sur the shoals

Surprise the currents of the main.

The hidden ledge

Turns turquoise into snow,

And phosphorescence

Burns round the granite reef.