Two Laments, a Prayer, & Two Songs
Mark Tredinnick
Herod the king, in his raging
Chargèd he hath this day
His men of might in his own sight
All young children to slay.
That woe is me, poor child, for thee
And ever mourn and may
For thy parting neither say nor sing
Bye bye, lully, lullay.
—from “The Coventry Carol"
1. The Lament of the Mother
Who can speak for death? The song survives
The singer. But who can say how death
runs? None comes back. So hard, this life, death
may be softer for you, my little
one. I pray, for one can neither say
nor sing, this dying day: bye bye, lully
lullay. Who keens for the singer who
outlives her song; the mother, her child;
the man? The world neither sings nor says.
2. The Lament of the Child
The Earth only makes blue days. As good
for raining bombs as for lighting lamps,
weather as ripe for joy as for war,
for gang gangs as grasses, for loving
as grieving.
And the days of the Child
this year in the south are such blue days,
ragged with breezes, sated with sun
and strafed with the sadness of a world
that neither says nor sings what it means.
3. A Prayer to the Earth
Earth itself is the heaven we fail,
most days, to hear.
Though first birds, each dawn,
sing up the light, see how we stumble.
But don’t give in; earth does not give in.
You’ll get the hang of this, the courage
love asks, the ear the music calls for.
Blame no one; this is on us—
all that
ails. And the peace we wish would hold waits
for us to sing it like we mean it.
4. The Song of the Days
This Earth is the poem we fail most days
to sing; the days make more trustworthy
songs.
Sure, there’s dying in them.
There’s loss.
But the living goes on; the world is
holy yet, notwithstanding the crooks
and freaks who seem to think they run it.
Listen to the wrens, those galaxies
of the undergrowth. While flame robins
burn all false worlds down, sing this one.
5. A Song for the Other Side of Loss
And see how the world heals, how it speaks
in light. How it gives itself to us.
Forget all that hurt you, the way dawn
forgets dark.
You’ll never be worthy
of the chance you’ve got here. Why not share
Your luck?
Save a life, pull a weed. Hope.
The priests and prophets, pimps and dealers:
they’re not the world; loss is not the world;
nor is the world lost.
Listen: it sings.