That Is No Country For Old Men*

Eumaeus 643

I pawned my eyes

to come to this favored opening

a wall so ill, so high with neither corner nor

darkness, where echo drowns in the dark sand

I lugged luck from harm across these bright waters

and made myself now elderly in this impatience

secondhand voices answer

from within a watering brain

it was a book of holes which described me

the former moments pass away

avoiding found wakefulness

and picked from ire

to keep all this intensity

from wanting your words.

Eumaeus 644

according to the floor, the

stones never fail

they outstay honesty and being.

their blood is on the night air -they get their

companions from certainty

and walk sinewless among

our mistakes

we will grasp the differences in failure

and look for the price of welcome

we will put down our arms and

disown winter

because the only thing left

is the end of all flesh

and the debt due.

Eumaeus 645

Madam Time withholding

character in a hat

death in mind and voices through doors

amateur music making all this desire

seem sacred

an opinion of worship

surely god is knowledge

ranting, dreaming, virtuous.

All these moody peasants

studying gems

for clues to perfection

air made of stone

its purpose eviction

these tenants of privilege.

*W.B. Yeats- "Sailing To Byzantium."