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Gray whale Now that we are sending you to The End That great god Tell him That we who follow you invented forgiveness And forgive nothing I write as though you could understand And I could say it One must always pretend something Among the dying When you have left the seas nodding on their stalks Empty of you Tell him that we were made On another day The bewilderment will diminish like an echo Winding along your inner mountains Unheard by us And find its way out Leaving behind it the future Dead And ours When you will not see again The whale calves trying the light Consider what you will find in the black garden And its court The sea cows the Great Auks the gorillas The irreplaceable hosts ranged countless And fore-ordaining as stars Our sacrifices Join your word to theirs Tell him That it is we who are important

Remember after work you grabbed our skateboard, crouched like a surfer, wingtips over the edge; wheels clacketing down the pocked macadam, you veered almost straight into the neighbor's hedge? We ran after you laughing, shouting, Wait! Or that August night you swept us to the fair? The tallest person boarding the Ferris wheel, you rocked our car right when we hit the apex above the winking midway, to make us squeal. Next we raced you to the games, shouting, Wait! At your funeral, relatives and neighbors, shaking our hands, said, "So young to have died!" But we've dreamt you're just skating streets away, striding the fairgrounds toward a wilder ride. And we're still straggling behind, shouting,Wait—!

Because you’ll find how hard it can be to tell which part of your body sings, you never should dally with any young man who does any one of the following things: tries to beat all the yellow lights; says, “Big deal!” or “So what?” more than seven times a day; ignores yellow lines in a parking lot; carries a radar detector; asks what you did with another date; has more than seven bumper stickers; drinks beer early and whiskey late; talks on a cellular phone at lunch; tunes to radio talk shows; doesn’t fasten his seat belt; knows more than God knows; wants you to change how you do your hair; spits in a polystyrene cup; doesn’t use his turn signal; wants you to change your makeup; calls your parents their given names; doesn’t know why you don’t smoke; has dirt under his fingernails; makes a threat and calls it a joke; pushes to get you to have one more; seems to have trouble staying awake; says “dago” and “wop” and words like that; swerves a car to hit a snake; sits at a table wearing a hat; has a boneless handshake. You’re going to know soon enough the ones who fail this little test. Mark them off your list at once and be very careful of all the rest.

I see the ships, the plotted crash, The stateroom’s purgatory trash, The waiting wedged and still no splash. There is the torch that burns not through Unless it drowns the sailor crew Shoring the bulkhead pinning you. And then the priest who, being ill, Intones through steel the bitter pill: This tomb is your last confession grille. I think of you awake in bed, Praying what all the voyage said: Have done with dying and be dead. It is a pride in loneliness Like some propriety of dress That shuns the water meant to bless; My hand as from a magnet pole Works to the Sunday dipping bowl To spot my tie and cross my soul.

I've watched his eyelids sag, spring open Vaguely and gradually go sliding Shut again, fly up With a kind of drunken surprise, then wobble Peacefully together to send him Home from one school early. Soon his lashes Flutter in REM sleep. I suppose he's dreaming What all of us kings and poets and peasants Have dreamed: of not making the grade, Of draining the inexhaustible horn cup Of the cerebral cortex where ganglions Are ganging up on us with more connections Than atoms in heaven, but coming up once more Empty. I see a clear stillness Settle over his face, a calming of the surface Of water when the wind dies. Somewhere Down there, he's taking another course Whose resonance (let's hope) resembles The muttered thunder, the gutter bowling, the lightning Of minor minions of Thor, the groans and gurgling Of feral lovers and preliterate Mowglis, the songs Of shamans whistled through bird bones. A worried neighbor Gives him the elbow, and he shudders Awake, recollects himself, brings back His hands from aboriginal outposts, Takes in new light, reorganizes his shoes, Stands up in them at the buzzer, barely recalls His books and notebooks, meets my eyes And wonders what to say and whether to say it, Then keeps it to himself as today's lesson.

Is there, for honest poverty, That hings his head, an' a' that? The coward slave, we pass him by, We dare be poor for a' that! For a' that, an' a' that, Our toils obscure, an' a' that; The rank is but the guinea's stamp; The man's the gowd for a' that, What tho' on hamely fare we dine, Wear hoddin-gray, an' a' that; Gie fools their silks, and knaves their wine, A man's a man for a' that. For a' that, an' a' that, Their tinsel show an' a' that; The honest man, tho' e'er sae poor, Is king o' men for a' that. Ye see yon birkie, ca'd a lord Wha struts, an' stares, an' a' that; Tho' hundreds worship at his word, He's but a coof for a' that: For a' that, an' a' that, His riband, star, an' a' that, The man o' independent mind, He looks and laughs at a' that. A prince can mak a belted knight, A marquis, duke, an' a' that; But an honest man's aboon his might, Guid faith he mauna fa' that! For a' that, an' a' that, Their dignities, an' a' that, The pith o' sense, an' pride o' worth, Are higher rank than a' that. Then let us pray that come it may, As come it will for a' that, That sense and worth, o'er a' the earth, May bear the gree, an' a' that. For a' that, an' a' that, It's coming yet, for a' that, That man to man, the warld o'er, Shall brothers be for a' that.

(SUGGESTED INSCRIPTION PROBABLY NOT SUGGESTED BY THE COMMITTEE) The hucksters haggle in the mart The cars and carts go by; Senates and schools go droning on; For dead things cannot die. A storm stooped on the place of tombs With bolts to blast and rive; But these be names of many men The lightning found alive. If usurers rule and rights decay And visions view once more Great Carthage like a golden shell Gape hollow on the shore, Still to the last of crumbling time Upon this stone be read How many men of England died To prove they were not dead.

1914 For all we have and are, For all our children's fate, Stand up and take the war. The Hun is at the gate! Our world has passed away, In wantonness o'erthrown. There is nothing left to-day But steel and fire and stone! Though all we knew depart, The old Commandments stand:— "In courage kept your heart, In strength lift up your hand." Once more we hear the word That sickened earth of old:— "No law except the Sword Unsheathed and uncontrolled." Once more it knits mankind, Once more the nations go To meet and break and bind A crazed and driven foe. Comfort, content, delight, The ages' slow-bought gain, They shrivelled in a night. Only ourselves remain To face the naked days In silent fortitude, Through perils and dismays Renewed and re-renewed. Though all we made depart, The old Commandments stand:— "In patience keep your heart, In strength lift up your hand." No easy hope or lies Shall bring us to our goal, But iron sacrifice Of body, will, and soul. There is but one task for all— One life for each to give. What stands if Freedom fall? Who dies if England live?

Ginsberg, Ginsberg, burning bright, Taunter of the ultra right, What blink of the Buddha’s eye Chose the day for you to die? Queer pied piper, howling wild, Mantra-minded flower child, Queen of Maytime, misrule’s lord Bawling,Drop out! All aboard! Finger-cymbaled, chanting Om, Foe of fascist, bane of bomb, Proper poets’ thorn-in-side, Turner of a whole time’s tide, Who can fill your sloppy shoes? What a catch for Death. We lose Glee and sweetness, freaky light, Ginsberg, Ginsberg, burning bright.

Among other things, thanks for explaining how the generous death of old trees forms the red powdered floor of the forest.