For a Child in Time of Famine

Once down the hills of laughter he raced
With the sun like a golden kite sailing from his shoulder
And the valley corn like a yellow river at his feet,
Till night with stars and torches came, and a dream
Of morning rays like shining horses to bestride.

But O this black night no dawn shall dissolve
With the sun shouting his cock’s song from the hill
And the earth like a sunflower lifting
From the long shadow her lighted hair.

And he that with his small birdvoice
Sang his love in my heart’s withered tree
And danced in the golden dust of the gathered grain
Must now forever songless be.

For O the cornlands like bonfires have burned away
And the fields are dark and the laughter loth,
And from the body’s hollows white bones creep
Like hungry owls edging into the sun.
And no, not all his anguish will find that field
Golden, like a cloak, his thin skeleton to clothe.