Lynne Wycherley
William Blake and the Dulwich Hill Angel
Blake:
He was gloved in radiance. The tree quivered
as if it held a meteor in its hand.
I stepped closer. He was an osprey,
he was a waterfall, he was a sheaf of stars.
I peered into his face and I saw comets
trailing white tears. Tracts of space.
I looked at the tree and it shimmered.
Silked with summer, breathing light.
I ran to my father. I saw an angel
on Dulwich Hill! He frowned, shrugged
me aside. I jabbed him like a horsefly.
But I did! I did! He raised his hand
but could not scare the angel from my mind.
Angel:
I am fire raining through space.Solar winds,
ion-storms. I watch this planet
roll its soothing sky, a niche of peace
between the pyres of the universe.
Who is this boy with lucid brown eyes?
His candour bares me. He looks
into the galaxies, the Magellanic Clouds
breathing through me, and is not afraid.
Can god’s lightening dance in the mind of a child?
I fear for him, this large-boned boy
and the brown flowers of his eyes.
I cannot close the doors between our worlds:
he would tilt his face and blow them away. Like feathers.
Page(s) 69
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