I Heard The Weeping Of Words And After This, The Illuminations (Final Version) Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

for William Blake

in a dream I heard the weeping of words, the great Bruising
the ancient sounds from the rocks from the ground
the distances in singing, the anguish of breaking apart
in a dream I saw the ore of them taken
and on every shore the shells they had become, forsaken
forlorn

shells of words I have gathered in my small hands
breathing back into them life with such futility, the memory of
before
when Light was at the door....
how can I say much less sing the stone trapped words

or they are caught in a web we have made for them
in the history of lies no longer responding to their childhood names.

oh God. I cried in a dream and could barely choke out his Name
for grief that words had fallen fallen
into such disdain.

mary angela douglas 28 october 2021; 14 april 2023