Shine, Perishing Republic

[pynchonoid]

Shine, Perishing Republic
by Robinson Jeffers

While this America settles in the mould of its
vulgarity, heavily thickening
to empire
And protest, only a bubble in the molten mass, pops
and sighs out, and the
mass hardens,
I sadly smiling remember that the flower fades to make
fruit, the fruit rots
to make earth.
Out of the mother; and through the spring exultances,
ripeness and decadence;
and home to the mother.
You making haste haste on decay: not blameworthy; life
is good, be it stubbornly
long or suddenly
A mortal splendor: meteors are not needed less than
mountains:
shine, perishing republic.
But for my children, I would have them keep their
distance from the thickening
center; corruption
Never has been compulsory, when the cities lie at the
monster's feet there
are left the mountains.
And boys, be in nothing so moderate as in love of man,
a clever servant,
insufferable master.
There is the trap that catches noblest spirits, that
caught – they say –
God, when he walked on earth. 

(1963)

<http://www.antiwar.com/orig/jeffers1.html>




__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Platinum - Watch CBS' NCAA March Madness, live on your desktop!
http://platinum.yahoo.com