Love must not be, but take a body too
Air and Angels
—John Donne
The primal metaphor has been transposed
as sleep an affiance with death eludes
for death defective is but sleep. Alludes
to resurrection now: a dawning rosed
in bloody-red genesis, predisposed
to whited hues dazzling out in amplitudes.
Thus pagan beauties to beatitudes
and logos to Logos metamorphosed.
The body too transfigured: taken for
love, then for love abused, it becomes love—
metaphysical conceit ‘comes metaphor
concrete so glorified by God above.
Sweet Alleluias fill the air; herald
Spirit’s imminent advent, joy-caroled.
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We hope you will join us in The Imaginative Conservative community. The Imaginative Conservative is an online journal for those who seek the True, the Good, and the Beautiful. We address culture, liberal learning, politics, political economy, literature, the arts and the American Republic in the tradition of Russell Kirk, T.S. Eliot, Edmund Burke, Irving Babbitt, Wilhelm Roepke, Robert Nisbet, Richard Weaver, M.E. Bradford, Eric Voegelin, Christopher Dawson, Paul Elmer More, and other leaders of Imaginative Conservatism. Some conservatives may look at the state of Western culture and the American Republic and see a huge dark cloud which seems ready to unleash a storm that may well wash away what we most treasure of our inherited ways. Others focus on the silver lining which may be found in the next generation of traditional conservatives who have been inspired by Dr. Kirk and his like. We hope that The Imaginative Conservative answers T.S. Eliot’s call to “redeem the time, redeem the dream.” The Imaginative Conservative offers to our families, our communities, and the Republic, a conservatism of hope, grace, charity, gratitude, and prayer.
This poem was first published here in April 2020.
The featured image is “La Résurrection. Tableau de l’école de Nicolas Coypel. Lambris du chœur de l’église Saint-Sulpice de Fougères.” This file is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
