Even Now

Montale’s “Little Testament”

That which at night like a will-o’-the-wisp

lightens the skullcap of my thought,

the mother-of-pearl trail of the snail

or the glittering dust of crushed glass

is no church light, no office light

that’s fed

by a clerk, either black or red.

All I can leave behind for you

is this rainbow, this iris,

the only witness to a faith

that has been battered,

a scraping of hope that burnt slower

on the hearth than green hardwood.

And so, Harry, keep this spectrum,

this iridescent pollen,

in your pocket mirror

when all the lamps have been extinguished,

when hell has broken loose,

when a dark lucifer lands, exhausted,

on a bend in the Thames, the Hudson, the Seine,

shakes the pitch from his wings

and says, This is the hour.

It is no inheritance, no talisman

that can keep the cobwebs of memory intact

through the wet, hot wind of summer.

(A story can only survive in ash.

Perseverance is tantamount to annihilation.)

Righteous was your sign.

Those who have seen it can only

find you. Each recognises his own.

Your haughtiness was no flight,

your humility was not low

when you lit your black light somewhere far away

there was no smell of sulphur.