After Borges

1. To a minor poet

Where are the days you spent on earth,
all the joy and anguish
that were your universe?

The river of years has washed them away;
now you survive
as an entry in the index.

Proudly they gather, the gods’ gifts, immortal.
Of you, dark friend, all we know
is that one evening you heard the nightingale.

Walking fields of asphodels, your slighted shade
must think the gods harsh
but the days are a tangle of paltry needs

and is there really a blessing richer
than the ash of which oblivion’s made?
For others the gods kindled

a persistent light: see
how it shines in every crevice, finds every flaw
and in the end shrivels the rose it treasures.

They were kinder to you, brother, passing you by,
leaving you to the nightingale in the garden
in the thrill of a dusk which will never darken.

2. To whoever is reading me

You’re untouchable. Haven’t they told you,
the powers that control your every move,
that dust is certain? Or did you imagine
your stepping into it could slow the river?

The slab has been ordered, you won’t
be reading it. Date, time and place
already inscribed, a well-judged epitaph.
And not just you – everyone else is a dream
of time, neither deathless bronze nor shining gold.

The universe like you is a shifting stream.
You’ll be a dark shade walking
to promised darkness, the route is fixed.
In a sense, you could say, you’re already dead.

3. Everness

There’s only one thing that doesn’t exist – oblivion.
God, who saves the metal, hoards the dross
and files in his prophetic memory
moons yet to shine with those long gone.
Everything is there. Every reflection
from dawn to dusk you left behind in mirror
after mirror, and every face you’ll go on leaving.
And everything is fixed in its place
in the eternal memory of the universe.
Corridors like labyrinths, the sound of doors
endlessly closing. . . but only
from the other side of the setting sun,
should you ever get there,
will you see the archetypes and the splendours.

A poem from The Rooms

Poem beginning with two lines by André Breton

The wardrobe is filled with linen,
there are even moonbeams I can unfold.
The roof has slipped back on the gables,
old trees march in from the cold.

The wardrobe is filled with linen,
the beds are slept in again.
Out of the air spill table and chairs,
the wine has crept back to the rim.

The wardrobe is filled with linen,
the drawers are packed with days.
The cabinet lies unsmashed in its corner,
there’s a harvest of sun on the floor.

The wardrobe is filled with linen,
the shadows come back to the wall.
They’ve gone to collect the children
from the strangers who stand in the hall.

The rooms are empty and cold,
the drawers are littered with bones.
The wardrobe is filled with linen
no-one can touch or unfold.

This appeared in yesterday's Irish Times but as the formatting got mangled on the Times' website I'm reposting it here. The collection it's taken from, The Rooms, will be published by Gallery Press in November.