two poems

from THE MASQUE OF THE TWELVE MONTHS

Shine out, fair Sun, with all your heat,
   Show all your thousand-coloured light!
Black Winter freezes to his seat;
   The grey wolf howls, he does so bite;
Crook't Age on three knees creeps the street;
   The boneless fish close quaking lies
And eats for cold his aching feet;
   The stars in icicles arise:

Shine out and make this winter night
Our beauty's Spring, our Prince of Light!

  --anonymous, twelfth century



from THE MOON AND THE YEW TREE

The moon is no door. It is a face in its own right.
White as a knuckle and terribly upset.
It drags the sea after it like a dark crime; it is quiet
With the O-gape of complete despair. I live here.
Twice on Sunday, the bells startle the sky--
Eight great tongues affirming the Resurrection.
At the end, they soberly bong out their names.

  --Sylvia Plath