Held Aloft By Angels Did He Depart (Or Just Like A Prism In Tears) Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

[goodbye, exceptional artist and poet,
David Bowie]

was anyone else like this? a harlequin
who made himself into his own material
regardless of the pain; almost not human; just

his own art, and that only... or how can you say it
best, he himself was the canvas and the rest-
painted on, hammered and nailed: by his own hands only

snowdrifted hands thousand jeweled

a billion interpretations couldn't convey the whole

and he was lost there or he
was his own nations praying;
in astronomical dimensions dusted, obscuring

his own army losing the way
it seems to us without a map
mercurial to the farthest power

exponent of colours not in our spectrum,
hearing, sight or hummingbird quicksilvered
minute by minute fanning the air in costume in space or out of it

too many to keep account of
certainly not by critics erased

changed rearranged and with an anguish
delicate as a filament keeping a universe alight
and often filled with fright I felt beyond all singing

possible. clown of night of the carnival suspended
misrepresented. fingerprinted
you still won't know anything about him

the original alien's alien

maybe on other planets or one in
particular he might have been king
dressed in a silver outfit, a violet smile

always falling down in this hemisphere
making the falling down a song

a shudder and the chrysalis shifts
and falling up, his own maze
then he grew wings. amazing

he was here for awhile. or even at all.
so vastly riddled
we never knew him.

and know it now, a little:
[o bluebird shining too brightly;
oh prism in tears for years...]

disappeared

mary angela douglas 11 january 2016