There Is No Last Of The Romantics, End To The Transfiguration Of The Swans Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

swans in the mirror of the soul
float on, having been banned from
post modern poetry.
where else would they go?

constricted and confined
condensed at the ballet to
save the audience time;

devoid of meaning

no longer needed at school
slipping through the slit
of the Valentine box

wrapped in silver foil
decorated with red construction paper hearts
on white lace paper doilies, no more.

configured differently-
oh! not at all.
for they shone brilliantly
beyond the dress-circle diamonds of the

spectators who cannot guess now
when the clues are far too few
what they are missing.
over the footlights

swans in the mirror of the soul
the ballet blanc adrift
drift on a wisp of
Pavlova remembered, perhaps the
waters of Coole;
half-murmured in a dream

emblems no longer transformed,
transforming
your former poets mourn
and supplicate but you must be

dreaming
they say to you the postmoderns
who still write this way
and mock the reemergence
ot the lines that float that way
as if this were a kind of joke

and they'll hold out to you
the fruitless tree the ragged branch instead
the world pruned back and judge the
unseen, too rich and variegated the
thread of what has been
snapped like a violin string

no cream for the apple tart.

other ages darker than this
you think but cannot say
were less remiss
have known have known the
soft flutter of few stars,
alone above the trees and witnessed, then, that

the swans in the mirror of the soul
float on and exquisite as pearl by pearl
impervious to wars, cultural or otherwise-
to poets unlearning their trade
wild Beauty wild with grief
beyond your censure
unraveling and undeterred.

mary angela douglas 19 december 2013; 22 november 2014; 28 december 2014; 23 october 2023