Un Petit Cortege Minus The Rainbows Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

to Rupert Brooke and the others

it's just a little cortege and not white satin
pale as a summer moon.
she would have worn forsythia if

it were noon and violet gloves.
it's just a little cortege.
she's skipping geranium this season

that was for the cotillion,
Christmas tidings, tide.
it's just a little cortege.

a gold spray of holly
garnet slippers crossed her mind
a dress of infinite snow
but not the little cortege
stumbling into trembling sunlight-

losing the drumbeat
all her rainbows with it:
wartime poets-
one by radiant one.

mary angela douglas 4 october 2013