To The Golden Age And To The King Of Heaven Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

I was saved by the Golden Age.

by the notion of it in the notions counter of Heaven

and as it was recorded over long centuries. millenia


sinking under an emerald sea. we cry to loveliness

come back!


what was it we couldnt remember that stirred in a dawn wind.

we couldnt remember but a faraway gleam

of something that seemed so paradisical


and green.

something we once knew.

and each child knows knows with maypole ribbons fluttering


knew from the beginning and finds it sometimes in play

on the afternoon of something who can say what

a light appears in the sky like a birthday


from an unexpected source. and it rains down opals.

meteor showers in the daytime

or suddenly pink flowers small in the grass arrive overnight


express delivery from Whom?


and you stop to ask as you stoop down

oh who made you this beautiful.

I was saved by the golden age


by its name in every language on earth

by stories that accumulated from birth, by the old hymns

and all of the merry carols carillon ringing



by infinite singing around the house



just that suddenly you feel you are on a stage


where the curtains will rise the moon and the stars with them

and nothing bad will ever happen again.


mary angela douglas 21 july 2020