I Saw A Shimmering Country In The Clouds (Final Version, Reformatted Stanzas) Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

[to the memory of my Grandmother at the piano]

I saw a shimmering country in the clouds
and I cried.

Rose-petal showered was that morning,
honey spread on bread, toasted clear amber;

marigold butter, now how far away
yet gathered within, a white flowered perfume unstoppered
elegantly for the Lord.
and rose-gold note sustained.

where will we be fed again such wonders
as in the kingdoms wavering between
sleep and the almost jeweled but

seldom crowned on this side of things.
the blue grass fades past the windows
whirling out of Oz with the four leaf clover
pressed in the book of the Pleiades
on my Grandmother's shelf.

I met sheer poets there, so early in the day
before the long rains came;
plaster of paris clarity of the great composers.
and after the zinnias in my Grandfather's gardens reinged.

behind these winter trees the skies are mauve
but chords on a cloud piano seem so unresolved.
like the nightingale trill in my one nocturne.

now who has led them away in chains
of ghost mists, time's reprisals
missing the harp's glissando
all these things

under the fifth column
of the Stars-

mary angela douglas 23=24 october 2012'10 october 2023