Prelude Poem by ENOCH JOHN

After the rhapsody and all the wind's exhilaration,
My heart is lifted to the ecstasy of heaven
Beyond the blue rim of a sparsely painted sky
Where roam cherubims and glad seraphs,
Chanting their holy incantations as a mantra.
God is in his heaven and the earth idles man.
I remember the happy days[memoria praeteritorum
bonorum], and the cadenza of boyhood. I wish though,
the leaves hadn't turned brown as quickly.
So quickly. But time flies as the North wind,
And only memories return to taunt us
Or to haunt us as a poltergeist. My hair
Turns grey as an overcast sky of August,
while the gulls fly in the distance.
I'm forty-five now. Tomorrow, much older
and wiser. As wise perhaps as a regent
or a village elder who speaks more sparingly
and slower than the folly of youth.. Gerontion pauses
With his grey mustached mask, calling
Us younger men to stand in the line of duty
as a colonnade of coconut trees silently
Soldiering the wave-beaten esplanade.