For That Which Is Beautiful The Poets Carried Water Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

we would have painted clouds on the horizon

to keep her from thirst

or carried the last drop of water in a thimble

across ten saharas

this much we cared for Beauty

for the ark embroidered song

and the seven rainbows

though masses cried you do us wrong

who speak no word to revolution

but I, I who have bartered the need to belong am happy

for the feeling all along sans restitution

that paper roses (poems) could bloom and just like that

become the real thing

or you could find yourself on the wrong train going back in a

dream

and suddenly step off into a field of pink clouds forever

concealed from the grisly righteous.

to tell such stories was our aim

to keep her from wandering away

her lilied hem from trailing in the dust

to keep the yellow light in the rain soaked window

all through winter alight and bear the living flame

that we should find in God bright raiment again

without a coin without a name, still let beauty ever reign

though we're looked at with disdain by all the socially thundering

that children may hunt flowers and stars, bright agates

and not lose wonder.

mary angela douglas 8 october 2021; 18 june 2023