RONATHON! GUISES: A CHAINSONG FOR THE MUSE

Ronald H. Bayes' GUISES: A CHAINSONG FOR THE MUSE, NEW & SELECTED POEMS 1970-1990, was published 1992 by Northern Lights Press. The title poem was lauded by Carolyn Kizer as "...one of the best poems Bayes has ever written." Here it is in full.



GUISES: A CHAINSONG FOR THE MUSE
--To Joshu

I.

I am here
the fourth time,
16 years to the day since the last
I discover by calendar (not plan)
in my room in the Esja Hotel, Reykjavik,
not even built then!
27 years since the first: & in the 26th
year thereof, the first time in your arms
through that dearest one of three
even then your surrogates.

We are each always in a different guise,
but in this guise I've not by odds
as long to live again, by half, where
you we know eternal.

You lower your eyes.
Beautiful!

The drumbeat of the rain.
The mountain across and
the bay half hidden.

          Joash was seven years old
          when he began to reign, and
          he reigned forty years in
          Jerusalem. His mother's name also
          was Zibiah of Beersheba.

          And Joash did that which was
          right in the sight of the Lord all
          the days of Jehoiada the priest.
          And Jehoiada took for him
          two wives; and he begat sons and
          daughters.

          And it came to pass that after this
          Joash was minded to repair
          the house of the Lord.

          All time is in time.
          All time is out of time.

The bay half hidden.
Beautiful!

II.

The child is going
back to the flag poles.
He has proudly raised
the flags at daybreak
as he proudly lowered them
in the wind and rain
last evening.

He now goes with
a dustpan and small broom
to make the grooming
as fine as it can be for
the day. His clipped
hair over his brow
brown, blown in the wind.

His hair is gray.

III.

...We bring our years to an end,
as it were, a tale that is told.

The cross
& the harp
& the many
who weep
honor you.

Comfort us now
after the time that thou hast
plagued us

for we are yet outlaws.

IV.

He holds the delicate
well-muscled body,
the cross made
by the sword at rest now
in the dragon's neck.

We brought nothing
into this world
after the time that thou
hast plagued us.

V.

& even we renegades
can see their hollow eyes, their
frightened children:
the workers out of work
who would work.

Comfort us again now
after the time that thou
hast plagued us.

VI.

My darling's
skeleton.

VII.

The dawn is fierce.
The dawn is a brute.

VIII.

See the calm headsman?
See the job done?
See the axe-finished corpse?
There, at the base of the cliff.

IX.

Yet as from a gambler's dicethrow-fate
on the other side of the rise,
far side of desperation,
one lies on his back
face-up to the cow's teats &
she nourishes him, benignly,
and he will rise and see
to her food and shelter
after all.

I should utterly have fainted,
but that I believe verily to see
the goodness of the Lord in
the land of the living.

Still...

X.

The deaths of
all
we love!

The young and the great and
predictable
coequal death-hurt,
our contemporaries.

XI.

We pray
& weeping
hide
our eyes.

XII.

Building, building
against all odds.

XIII.

Perhaps
a king out of Egypt?
or Iceland?

XIV.

The mother's vision!

XV.

The pain of the mother.

XVI.

Dependency,
labor
& prayer
& labor.
I do not understand
& am
even too weary
to curse.

XVII.

See? The strong old one restrains
the young man
& whispers in his ear,
each on the back
of the same
dying horse.

EPILOGUE:

Thou foolish one,
that which thou sowest
is not quickened,
except it die;
and that which thou sowest,
thou sowest
not that body that shall be,
but bare grain...
but God giveth it a body
and to every seed
its own body.

All flesh
is not the same flesh.

You!
Rising from this meditation,
come
in your birthday suit
(with a top hat),
& tangle limb
cavort on the lawn
between the
stable
butts of
wine.

It will not darken utterly
for some time.