390 and 391

In response to Sir Thomas Wyatt’s Farewell Love and all thy Laws for ever:

Sir Wyatt, did your thoughts improve that much

without your muse to whisper them to you?

I say, my mind no more on joy could touch

when Love was gone, so went clarity, too.

I’ll take the fog that clouds the mind in Love

above the mists that haze in Solitude

each day. More harm can come alone thereof

than all the loftiness of Love, tho crude.

For light within the eye, tho it can blind,

is better than the darkness that you seek.

In dark, you can’t see what you want to find,

but light at least will speak, be it oblique.

I would not want the quiet dark you praise,

Love blesses quite as much as it betrays.

~~~

The Seven Days of January: iv:

No fresher morns than January’s are

there in the whole of all the lasting year.

The walk from your front door down to your car

can wake you better than cold water clear.

You get the thrill of mountain camp-side morns

as first light breaks on days like these, without

the smell of smoke or sock soles strewn with thorns

that comes with that of domiciling out.

It’s not so cruel as it has hither been

for now the air rewards you with that smell

that brings a taste like drink before your skin,

and rings inside your nose like a church bell.

Do not forget to get outside quite soon

each morn to know this January boon.