The Swan-Song On The Waters Floated Poem by Emmanuel George Cefai

The swan-song on the waters floated, yet
There were no swans

Green-eyed the shrubbery around, all moist and
Damp

‘Ok’ said the goblin and he leapt into the waters
Swam under the night moon

Along the shore how many, how many, sacred
Ancestors queued!

Yet our population was their population though
Diminished, less

They lisped rather than talked and less than
Whispered

Yet in their communal prayer communication
They lifted
A plaint that went up absorbed in the high heavens

There dissolved and mixed with those immensities
Themselves

Rattled and shifted in mixing, became one with them,
With the high heavens immense.

Of earthly emotions there was dour suspension;
The doors were closed for Sovereign Night had
Come

And still grew the queue that ceased not, that of
Ancient ancestors

Along the shore of spells how many, many, more
Came all the time!

The Angel on his harp with servant seraphs,
Strung notes solemn verses epic and noble

For in that moment those verses were the verses.

The night rained its night-dews the same, slow and
Steadily.

Then as the night deepened the spells transfigured and
Transformed to mists of rainbow hues

Yet in the distant kilometers shone the mists as white
For the night still
Rained slow and weeping its serene night-dews.

The yolk of egg, the crown of white lilied beauties
Floating
Through those dense misted reigns they marched
Over the waters to the tune of music
And stringing of a million violins
From all sides of the waters’ edges all around.

Thus proceeded forth the demure maidens over
The growing frost
They tiptoed light, so light, on the sea-bosom,
And floated sighing by the water lilies.

Fragments all these, yet together gathered,
They shape an Orchestra of Night still
In the shaping.

You will stop at a fragment now, they have been
Several
And still the shaping of a structure still
Not complete and never to be complete
In evolution continues yet
On the other side a percentage of it stays
A structure rudimental, but a structure.

Thus we, we humans; thus with our lives incomplete
And with what we accomplish incomplete
However brilliant, however our sacrifices,
However our toils till in deep midnight.

Evolution ensures no satisfaction, that from
Completeness comes.

The silent skeleton always rattles with desires
Plans thoughts and fires
That were to be accomplished yet were not
Accomplished.

Even so, let us the silent skeleton take as our master
Even as we breathe
He is the epitome relative of ruthless ever-going Evolution
Let so be so.

And now
The sounds of violins lessen, lessen, lessen,
Evaporate the mists, fade the long queues
That loaded all the edges of the waters,
And all the other things we sang of now,
They faded slow yet fast as the grains slip
From under the hands of our stunned faces.

The Dawn advances soon it will be here.
Another day, another cycle
Yet another fading
Another night as the above in making
In birth of Dawn next night be in the making