Relevance/All These Bright Soldiers Falling In The Mist Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

to Sidney Lanier, the American Keats (1842-1881)

is it too late to let you know
the green shade in your marshes
lingers still-

and the tree-tiered cathedrals, depth-on-depth that
you believed in?

who can replace all those
born with a feeling for music;
still less, the few
whom Music loved:

crowding Beauty in a
handful of poems
on less than a lifetime's sigh-

it takes that long
to understand
all these bright soldiers
falling in the mist
that we have left behind-

mary angela douglas 1 march 2012

Note: on the question of relevance in poetry in my opinion as Emily Dickinson inferred all those are relevant who died for Truth or Beauty