But I woke in an old ruin that the winds howled through
W B Yeats
Back in the age of candlelight and grandeur,
of banquets in the chieftain’s mansion,
there was meat and drink
for the ladies and the lords
and tunes upon the harpsichord.
But all that is history, the candle-factory
ceased to prosper, ceased to exist.
In the ruins of the chieftain’s mansion
there are trespassers in a state of bliss.
They are there for the dope and the pills.
There’s a cider-party, a ghetto-blaster
blasting Lady Gaga; chicken bones
and burger wrappers littering what remains
of the halls of marble, the rooms without tapestries
where phantoms go about their useless tasks.
from A Song of Elsewhere, Dedalus Press, 2015