Comedia

By Kevin McGrath

COMEDIA is a book about time, the emotions of time and the metaphors of time. It describes the cycle of the year in terms of the human heart: the year being the ideal paradigm or pattern of all human experience.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Dec 19, 2007
• ISBN: 9781469121215

Kevin McGrath

Kevin McGrath was born in southern China in 1951 and was educated in England and Scotland; he has lived and worked in France, Greece, and India. Presently he is an Associate of the Department of South Asian Studies and Poet Laureate at Lowell House, Harvard University. McGrath lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with his family.

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Copyright © 2008 by Kevin McGrath.

Library of Congress Control Number:       2007908408

ISBN:         Hardcover                               978-1-4257-9604-4

                   Softcover                                 978-1-4257-9591-7

                   Ebook                                      978-1-4691-2121-5

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in

any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,

recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission

in writing from the copyright owner.

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris Corporation

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

[e-mail]

44885

CONTENTS

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P o e t i c s

To Guy Murdo McGRATH

Qui sarai tu poco tempo silvano . . . 

Pur. XXXII,100

C

OMEDIA

is a book about time, the emotions of time and the metaphors of time. It describes the cycle of the year in terms of the human heart: the year being the ideal paradigm or pattern of all human experience.

1

A HERON came before the dawn

As a high tide turned about,

Filling a silent world with light

Gold, tangerine, and crimson.

Where were you when day arose

As a sea gleamed completely molten,

When time shone upon the world

Where was your truth then?

The sun slipped into low cloud

Grey and nacreous reflecting,

As a flat metallic water streamed

Retreating towards the ocean:

Then you hid your face from us

As life spun slowly round,

A dark viridian forest became

Amber and numinous copper.

Pigeons murmured in the radiance

Were your wings folded then:

Were you wandering on earth

Or were you among the lions?

On the stones and in the dust

Horns of the hours are risen,

And from the springs I know

Your footsteps are soon with us.

You were my rock in the night

Your perfect body shining,

Smooth, unclothed and flawless

The most beautiful possible figure.

When the fox cried and owl muttered

Were you resting in my bed,

Or were you barefoot in the grasses

Flooding all the pathways

Your hands creating this?

2

In a bronze and apricot dawn

When the sea is without motion,

The birds begin their praise

One by one, each variously devoted.

The sun itself appears and throws

Down vermilion and molten ways,

As all of life begins to surge

Voices quiver with expression.

They speak of night and of fear

Of the kinship of warm senses,

Desire and need are recited

Becoming bright and complex.

Young women and young men

Are busy with