A circle round encompasses all things
Confusion, doubt, and death, despair, and love
A circle rounding, understanding brings
Both hearts and minds into the courts above
We look beyond it finding glimmered fact
That answers part, which thinking will obscure
In knowing part, the truth the wise redact
Thus we must their naiveté endure
It is is but shade and symptom of our own
O’re weighed with years and papers to confirm
It is at our misunderstandings thrown
To fight their dark until they fade, infirm
The circle, love, the wise will miss by thought
When children to the gates of heav’n are brought
For Alison on Temple Day
Filed under By Casey C. Jones
For Whom The Bell Tolls by John Donne
No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manner of thine own
Or of thine friend’s were.
Each man’s death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.
Filed under Favorite Poems
Father’s Day Eve, Two Thousand Eleven
Today a father is
Born, and remembered
Tomorrow a father
Remembered, and born
Today, Cameron William
Is father, and son
Tomorrow, William Henry
Remembered, mourned
Today, Casey Curtis
Grandfather, father, son
Tomorrow, God bless him
One
Filed under By Casey C. Jones
“Recessional” by Rudyard Kipling
God of our fathers, known of old—
Lord of our far-flung battle line—
Beneath whose awful hand we hold
Dominion over palm and pine—
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!
The tumult and the shouting dies—
The Captains and the Kings depart—
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!
Far-called our navies melt away—
On dune and headland sinks the fire—
Lo, all our pomp of yesterday
Is one with Nineveh and Tyre!
Judge of the Nations, spare us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!
If, drunk with sight of power, we loose
Wild tongues that have not Thee in awe—
Such boastings as the Gentiles use,
Or lesser breeds without the Law—
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!
For heathen heart that puts her trust
In reeking tube and iron shard—
All valiant dust that builds on dust,
And guarding calls not Thee to guard.
For frantic boast and foolish word,
Thy Mercy on Thy People, Lord!
Amen.
Filed under Favorite Poems
“The Glories of Our Blood and State” by James Shirley
The glories of our blood and state
Are shadows, not substantial things;
There is no armour against fate;
Death lays his icy hand on kings.
Sceptre and crown
Must tumble down,
And in the dust be equal made
With the poor crooked scythe and spade.
Some men with swords may reap the field,
And plant fresh laurels where they kill;
But their strong nerves at last must yield,
They tame but one another still.
Early or late,
They stoop to fate,
And must give up their murmuring breath,
When they, pale captives, creep to death.
The garlands wither on your brow,
Then boast no more your mighty deeds;
Upon death’s purple altar now,
See where the victor-victim bleeds.
Your heads must come
To the cold tomb;
Only the actions of the just
Smell sweet and blossom in their dust.
Filed under Favorite Poems
Sonnet From A Timeless Void
If from a timeless void we came to earth
A fragment of accelerated light
By God our Father fired into this birth
Or dropped it seems from some remotest height
If we had life before this life began
If we had breath before this breath we breathe
If we had run before this race we ran
If we had thought, before these thoughts we weave;
Then did we know, the limits of this time
How membrane-thin is this eternal slice
We knew our song extends beyond our rhyme
We knew this once, we yet will know it twice
Then shall we view life from the closing shore,
And find our light more brilliant than before
May 1, 2009
Filed under By Casey C. Jones
Sonnet For A Dream
In honest, self-reflection I admit
All my life a play of impotent dream
A cascade of doubt, disguised by small wit
Facade for eyes that see but what I seem.
Adrift in currents called humanity
With narrow channels marked and clearly drawn
Keeping close watch on what I want to be
Out somewhere between the dark and the dawn.
Yet in this reproach and caroled sorrow
One dream remembered acknowledges you
Empowering all dreams of tomorrow
With the memory of a dream, dreamed true.
For, from you knowing-feeling love’s true scope,
Creates of all tomorrows . . . dreams of hope.
November 29, 1992
Filed under By Casey C. Jones
