Classic Poem

But sometimes a whole day will keep
saying Live! Live! For the green's
sake and the blue's sake and the white
manticore clouds' — couchant or asleep
on the gentle thermals between ...

Less difficult an exhort-
ation than one to Love ,
say, which experience in-
dicates will either fall short
or be fallen short of

or to Peace , when it seems Peace
is just the compression mode
of an historical engine mixing
its volatile vainglories
pre-ordained to explode ...

If, in truth, the loveliest day
the elements ever unfurled
must float in indifference to us —
keep it so. Keep it so (I'd say,
were it last day of the world.)