Greyhair

Greyhair fool, shoes undone
The fields ahead
Leaves black as coal
Landmark-free, no walls, no trees

to greet him on this night of his return

CHORUS:
So who will love this lie on legs
who can't change skin and is not yet dead?
The universal foreigner
The homeless greyhair son

Scrambles blind up muddy slope
then silent shakes before rusty gates--CHORUS

There's a house, its roof caved in
A rusty wreck of car
A lightning-blasted tree
and a man who says, "So here you are--
the boy who broke the plough,
who struck his father down,
who told us to be damned
and betrayed us to the Englishman!"

"Who will love this lie on legs?
On paving-stones I've made my bed
Not a living soul now speaks my name
but here at least I have my shame
I thought to come and taste once more
what the priestly fables all ignore:
the un-eternal consequence," says the greyhair son

Greyhair fool, shoes undone
Hilltop at dawn
Now hews his plough
Wind blows on
The soil is poison
He sets to work, he and his plough
Final union--He and his plough