God of This World to His Prophet, The

Hudson Review, The, Winter 2002 by Coyle, Bill

Go to the prosperous city, for I have taken pity

on its inhabitants, who drink and feast and dance

all night in lighted halls yet know their bacchanals

lead nowhere in the end. Go to them, now, commend,

to those with ears to hear, a lifestyle more austere.

Tell all my children tired of happiness desired

and never had that there is solace in despair.

Say there is consolation in ruins and ruination

beneath a harvest moon that is itself a ruin,

comfort, however cold, in grievances recalled

beside a fire dying from lack of love and trying.