Lent 24: Civilization

In recognition of current news regarding same sex marriage in the UK, here’s a poem on the topic from Ian Duhig. It’s from his collection The Speed of Dark from early 2007, so it’s not the most current of treatments of the subject as you’ll see.

I’ve shared some Duhig before, it was from the same collection, too.

      Civilization

      Let no one to the marriage of true minds
      raise barriers or admit impediments:
      love is not love that alteration finds
      for bishops, governors or presidents –
      Bush claims ‘our fundamental institution’
      is somehow by your wedding under threat,
      then seeks to tamper with the Constitution.
      His Press Room echoes like a minaret.

      I stretch the metre of an antique song
      that your true rights may shine through my dull ink,
      for poets sometimes do stand up to wrong
      if not as often as we like to think.
      But if I lie, then Shakespeare couldn’t scan,
      no woman woman loved, nor man loved man.

View the intro/roundup.