The Changing Light at Sandover

by James Merrill

OF THAT SHIELD THE PYRAMID THE EGYPTIANS UNDERSTOOD

  WAS THAT EXACT PRISM OF LIGHT ENERGY THEY CD ONLY

  REPRODUCE IN STONE SUCH EXACT STRUCTURING IN QUARTZ WD

  HAVE MADE THEM MASTERS OF THE WORLD THE SUN KING AKHNATON

  DID THIS HE HAD MADE IN ROCK CRYSTAL 15 METERS HIGH

  SUCH A PYRAMID EVEN THO ALAS A FRACTIONAL

  MILLIMETER WRONG ITS GLOW WAS SEEN IN MINOAN SKIES

  UNDER THEBES TODAY IS THE MELTED LAKE OF HIS JEWEL

  What went wrong?

  THE PINNACLE POINTED CAPSTONE THRUOUT A YEAR POLISHD

  BY 1500 SLAVES WAS AT LAST LIFTED INTO PLACE

  AT NIGHT GREAT CRANES GROAND & HE WATCHD SO INTENSELY THRILLD HIS

  PHYSICIANS FED HIM OPIUM EACH HOUR THEY THEN WITHDREW

  B4 DAWN ON BARGES DECORATED WITH MINIATURE

  PYRAMIDS OF DIAMOND & DAWN BROKE A TOTAL SLOW

  SKYFILLING LIGHT BEGAN THE PEOPLE FELL ON THEIR FACES

  HE STOOD UPON HIS JEWELD BARGE WHILE DIAMONDS GLARED &

  SPLINTERD THE PYRAMID EVEN AS WE DID ROSE&FELL

  A GLORIOUS END AKHNATON & HIS QUEEN CUT THEIR WRISTS

  INTO THE CRIMSON WATERS & THEIR BARGE SANK

  And if he’d measured correctly?

              EARTH IN FLAMES

  THERA ON A DIRECT NORTHERN LINE ERUPTED MINOA

  PERISHD IN EGYPT THE CALM EYE OF THE ATOM ALONE

  THE PYRAMID & JEWELS ON THE BARGES EXPLODED

  2 DIAMONDS CLOSER TO EXACTITUDE MADE A LIGHT

  STRONGER THAN ALL COMBIND & THESE 2 MEASURED ONE 7TH

  OF A MILLIMETER THEBES WAS ABANDOND NOT DESTROYD

  THE DESERT ONCE FERTILIZABLE WAS 1200 YEARS

  QUITE BARREN & THIS BUT FOR THOSE 2 LITTLE DIAMONDS

  MIND U WAS HARDLY A FULL DRESS NUCLEAR EXPLOSION

  Which leads Them to the work. I am to measure

  My own pyramid—don’t ask me how.

  Numerals 1 through 0 will POINT THE WAY

  Moved by their narrative as by their may

  I call it faith that we will somewhere put

  Everything they tell to brilliant use,

  We promise gravely to give all we can.

  WE TOO WILL GIVE WHAT WE CAN WE WANT WHAT HAS IN FACT BEEN

  25 YEARS IN PREPARATION WE FIRST CALLD U THEN NOW

  U ARE READY YR LIVES ARE POLISHD HOISTED INTO PLACE

  JM DJ YOU ARE OUR CRYSTAL RECEIVE US WE ARE

  YR LIGHT THE 10 NUMBERS ARE YR MEASURE OURS WAS 14

  MES ENFANTS HOW MADDENING I MUST HAVE BEEN

  TO MY INTELLIGENT FRIENDS LOUROS POOR DEAR

  (Her doctor) TRYING TO EXPLAIN ONE HOT

  EVENING MY RADIATION TREATMENTS I

  BEGGED HIM STOP BORING ME WHEN HE DID NOT

  I SPILT MY COFFEE ON HIS LONDON SUIT

  DJ: Maria, did you know? THAT I WAS

  Pause. I KNEW The cup appears to pull

  Itself together. BUT COULD NOT LET FEAR SHOW

  (FEAR MY SLEAZY SLIP COULEUR DE PEAU)

  YOU DJ WHO FEAR SO MUCH & CRAVE

  THE COMFORT WE LOVE GIVING DONT FORGET

  LIFE TERRIFIES ALL ALL BUT THE UTTER FOOLS

  But you’re…not living, and still terrified.

  OF THEM AS U ARE I HAVE MORE TO LOSE

  Literally? I BELIEVE SO THEY CAN USE

  FI Censorship.

   Oh really, not again!

  (Cantabile) SHE HAS LEFT A MINOR CRISIS

  Who’s this? MES CHERS ONLY YR OLD Ah, Ephraim,

  Are we making trouble for Maman?

  She said that They could use fire—is it true?

  & ROUND U IN A WIDE CHARMED CIRCLE WHO

  DO U THINK STAND READY TO EXTINGUISH IT

  EPHRAIM & MAYA HANS & MARIUS

  WHA & CHESTER ALL OF US

  SO SHOW YR METTLE U ARE BIG BOYS NOW

  We gulp, and hope that Wystan has not seen

  Our panic. Do these talks repel him? GREEN

  MY DEARS WITH ENVY I COULD CURSE MY HIGH

  ANGLICAN PRINCIPLES IN OXFORD DAYS

  THE TABLES TAPPED OUT MANY A SMART OR EERIE

  RHYTHM UNTIL OUR POLITICS TOOK OVER

  THEN THE ABSORBING LOVES & THEN THE DREARY

  WASH CONFESSION DONT U SEE THE CHURCH

  MY DEARS THE DREARY DREARY DEAD BANG WRONG

  CHURCH & ALL THOSE YEARS I COULD HAVE HELD

  HANDS ON TEACUPS I AM RIVETED

  BUT NOT INCLUDED MIGHT ONE JOIN MM

  AT YOUR SEANCE Oh please! You’d raise the level

  Enormously—of course it’s up to Them.

  NOT AT ALL IT SHALL BE ORDERD AS THE SCRIBE DESIRES

  2

  Bethinking us of bargains with the devil,

  What, I wonder, do we stand to lose

  Or gain? Faust got his youth back—or was it life

  Eternal? Was there ever a real Faust?

  And how does one go about getting life eternal?

  NOT FAUST MY BOY IT WD SEEM THESE CREATURES ARE

  MORE LIKE INFORMATION BANKS TO TAP

  NO NEED TO SIGN AWAY THE SOUL Dear Wystan,

  Dead or alive, a mine of sense. Our school’s

  New kindergarten teacher shows concurrence

  By passing out this kit of tiny tools:

  : ‘ . ( ! ) — , / ?

  Now someone’s talking. The halfmoon of bare

  Board between our numbers and our letters

  Resembles a work-space for paper dolls.

  Wee scoops, tacks, tweezers, awl and buttonhook,

  Comma doubling as apostrophe

  And dash as hyphen—tinkering symbols known

  Not in themselves, but through effects on tone.

  The character who supplies them, by that token

  Distinguishes himself from who has spoken

  Up to now, and strikes a note we’ve missed,

  Clerkly but eager, glad to be with us—

  Young lab assistant, or cub journalist

  Thrilled by his first big scoop, yet not above

  Enhancing revelation with the odd

  Parenthesis or restful period.

  Is it still Bezel— I can’t say that name

  But you know who I mean: are you the same?

  2.1

  I HAVE A NUMBER: 741 ONE (U HAVE UNDERSTOOD)

  OF A FIGURATIVELY NUMBERLESS HOST WE ARE NOT

  AT ALL TIMES THE SAME INTELLIGENCE 40070

  SPOKE YESTERDAY

  He was fascinating, but that martinet

  Barging in on us the other night—

  40076 HE VEXD U HE WILL

  NOT RETURN

  DJ: You haven’t punished him! I sometimes

  Feel that your whole world is so inhuman.

  WE DO NOT REGULATE WE ARE MESSENGERS

  NOTHING MORE WE ARE ORDERD, THEN WE SLEEP ARE U AT EASE?

  POINTER PERHAPS SLOWER? WE MUST BE COMFORTABLE, NO?

  TEACH ME I AM THE PUPIL TODAY TELL ME OF…MANNERS?

  Now you shame us. We tell you? We who’ve been

  Remote and rude—but vexed more by our slowness

  Than by your discipline.

  YR VOICE IS SWEET And your pace gentle.

  THESE LESSONS ASK A BLEST ENVIRONMENT

  IF WE WORK WELL TOGETHER I CAN AGAIN BE SUMMOND

  MES ENFANTS THIS NEW ONE IS A DOVE

  You can’t mean—ONLY BY COMPARISON:

  THE LANDLORDS WHO CAME UPCOUNTRY FROM THE CITY

  SCREAMING
ORDERS NOW GET THE WORK DONE

  BY MURMURING THE DIALECT

       MY DEARS

  TOO DIZZY MAKING AT THE FEET OF 1

  2 3 FOURTEEN ENORMOUS VAMPIRE BATS

  SO LIKE ONE’S EARLIEST SENSE OF GOTHIC DECOR

  MAY I? THE FAUST LEGEND IS AN OLD ONE BASED UPON FACT:

  GOD B SENT 8002 TO POPE INNOCENT VI

  WITH INSTRUCTIONS TO END A PLAGUE THE POPE MADE A BARGAIN:

  IMMORTAL LIFE WHICH DISPLEASD GOD BIOLOGY SINCE DEATH

  IS PRODUCTIVE. INNOCENT GIVEN THE POWER TO BLESS

  AWAY THE PLAGUE (BY SIMPLY TELLING THEM TO BOIL WATER)

  HE USED IT. IT BECAME HIS IMMORTALITY THEN AS

  HE LAY COMPLAINING & DYING HE CURSED ALL BARGAINS WITH

  THE DEVIL THIS CURSE RETOLD SPREAD FAR BEYOND AVIGNON

  ENDING WHAT IN EUROPE HAD BEEN A THRIVING PAGANISM

  JM: I think I see where this is meant

  To lead us—clever! Faust was Innocent.

  INDEED A CERTIFIED PRIEST HIS LEGEND WAS NO LEGEND

  XTIANITY MADE AN EVIL OF WHAT ONCE HAD BEEN NOT

  BARGAINS BUT RITES, PRAYERS PRAYD & ANSWERD. IN SHORT THOSE CURES

  Made for an immortality, if not

  Quite the real thing. Which no one ever got?

  5 DID: LADUMAN SORIVA RACHEL TORRO & VON

  Von what? Just Von? OK, OK, go on.

  THESE HAVE LIVED CENTURIES & LIVE TODAY HELDOVER LIVES

  NOT IN THE SCHEME U KNOW OF THE 9 STAGES. REMAINING

  AWARE OF IT ALL, KNOWING THE FRUITLESSNESS OF SPEAKING

  OF THEIR KNOWLEDGE, THEY RETURN TO EARTH CHARGED WITH ENERGY

  BEYOND THE NORM EXAMPLE: HE WHO WAS MONTEZUMA

  NOW AN E GERMAN ASTROPHYSICIST, AT 30 LEADS

  HIS FIELD IN THE STUDY OF IN-SPACE RADIANT POWERS

  That last bit sounds at least potentially

  Scientific. Shouldn’t we hear more?

  JUST AS U WISH U HAVE NOT ASKD ABOUT THE UNIVERSE

  And, adding that tomorrow he’ll return

  To brief us on the subject, leaves

  —With fourteen others, Wystan, did you say?

  & MY DEAR THE HEAT! THEY GLOW LIKE FRANKLIN STOVES

  IN REDEYED MEMORY OF THEIR ORDEAL

  Any sign yet of the sons of Abel?

  TOO SOON THESE I PRESUME ARE THE CLERK TYPISTS

  OR IN YR WORDS THE BOBS THE FURNACE MEN

  I WD SUGGEST U BEAR DOWN FANCY NOT

  ASKING ABOUT THE UNIVERSE! See how Wystan’s

  Intellect begins to light the way.

  A COMFORT MON ENFANT BUT KEEPS HIS THROAT

  PROTECTED JUST IN CASE ALORS OFF GOES

  MAMAN TO CHANGE INTO SOMETHING LESS SCORCHED

  ASK TOMORROW ABOUT UFO’S

  2.2

  THE UNIVERSE: IT IS OUR NEIGHBOR WE DO NOT CONTROL

  OR FULLY KNOW ITS REACHES THERE4 OUR USE OF EXTRA-

  LIFE SOULS FOR RESEARCH LIKE MONTEZUMA WHO NOW BELIEVES

  WE RACE FOR ORDER UNDER ORDERS TO SAVE THE GREENHOUSE.

  THE STARS HAVE PATTERNS & SPEAK TO A PART OF OUR ORDERS.

  NOT UNLIKE THE HOLES IN COMPUTERIZED CARD RESPONSES

  MUCH TURNS ON THEIR ARRANGEMENT MONTHLY AS U KNOW IT BY

  CENTURY & MILLENIUM AS WE DO A NEW HOLE?

  A GAP? A NEW ARRANGEMENT FOR US: WE READ A VAST CARD

  U SEE SIDEWAYS DIMLY FLASHING

  The Milky Way? YES & READJUST: SPEEDS

  OF ROTATION ORBIT ANGLES POLAR CAP DENSITIES

  & HAVE GROWN TO FEEL GOD B’S GREENHOUSE RELATED, ITSELF

  A HOLE IN A COMPUTER CARD FOR OTHER GREENHOUSES

  WITHIN OUR UNIVERSE & AT OUR SAME RATE OF ADVANCE:

  WE WD HAVE DETECTED A SUPERSYSTEM OR IT US

  IN DANTE THE VISION WAS STARLIKE AS HE LOOKD INTO

  THE ATOM’S EYE HE SAW THE POTENTIAL OF PARADISE

  JM: Ah. This refers

  To that uncanny shining tininess

  Ringed with decelerating zones of light

  (Paradiso XXVIII) on which, says Beatrice,

  The heavens and all nature are dependent.

  ELECTRONICS, BY NOW QUITE ADVANCED THANKS TO COMMERCE’S

  PASSION FOR COMMUNICATIONS, TELLS U THERE ARE SIGNALS.

  THESE WE HAVE LONG HEARD & EVEN THESE CAME TO DANTE A

  KIND OF MUSIC HE PERSONIFIED IN FEMALE FORM &

  UP INTO THE TUSCAN HILLS FOLLOWD & LOST WHEREUPON

  HE SANK FAINTING TO HIS KNEES. WE SENT 80098

  So Ephraim’s version of the Comedy’s

  Origin isn’t wholly accurate.

  CALL IT A SATELLITE TRUTH THAT ORBITS THE ESSENTIAL.

  DANTE’S STRENGTH & THAT OF HIS TIME WAS FIERCE CREDULITY

  ALL POSSIBLE GOOD & EVIL WRESTLING REDEEMING LOVE

  & AWSOME VISION DREAM, FACT & EXPERIENCE WERE ONE.

  THOSE SIGNALS? THE UNIVERSAL WIND RATTLING HEAVEN’S DOOR:

  UP FROM THIS BEAT SWARMD DANTE’S POETRY HE HEARD IT &

  WE THRU HIM HEARD FOR THE 1ST TIME & RECOGNIZED AS TRUE

  THAT SEGMENT OF THE UNIVERSE HE UTTERD HIS VISION

  IS NOT OF OUR PARADISE BUT THE SOURCE OF ALL POWER

  The verse in Paradiso, to my ears,

  Rings with a new, impersonal energy.

  INDEED HE WENT DOWN THRU THE STAGES 9 TO 1 FROM 0

  DJ: O being that same zero point?

  YES JM IS GOING UP THE SCALE WE WILL SEE HOW FAR

  IF & WHEN THE ANGELS SPEAK TO U THEY SPOKE OUTRIGHT TO

  DANTE & THE 4 APOSTLES & THE TRANSPLANTED JEWS

  BUDDHA & MOHAMMED

  The Chosen People—if those two are Jews—

  Certainly had the knack of how to choose.

    U MUST KNOW THE REVIVAL OF

  SENTIENT LIFE AFTER OUR FALL WAS IN THE SEED OF THE JEW

  FROM THIS CAME ALL RACES: THE APE THEN THE JEW THEN THE REST

  U WILL BE TOLD THIS GREAT HISTORY ONE THING AT A TIME

  MM HAS ASKD ABOUT THE SAUCERS THEY SCOUT OUR GREENHOUSE

  & SEEM TO BE OF IT (FOR WE DO NOT KNOW ITS LIMITS)

  FORESTS & JUNGLES ATTRACT THEM THEY SEEM UNOCCUPIED.

  THINK OF ATOMICALLY POWERD BEES CHARGED WE BELIEVE

  WITH THE TRANSFERTILIZATION OF SENSE-DATA

  JM: Does that answer your question, Maman?

  Let me ask, is the moon made of green cheese?

             THE MOON

  JM IS A MONUMENT TO OUR FAILURE IT SPUN OFF

  FROM THE STUFF OF OUR WORLD IN A PUFFBALL OF BLAZING DUST

  Yes, yes, that old hypothesis: the moon

  Torn from Earth’s side—

  NO NO NO WE MADE IT IT WAS THE CRUST ROTATION SWEPT

  UP & FUSED OUR DEBRIS INTO A HAUNTING REMINDER

      A crust composed of what?

  MATERIALS THE ATOM MADE NONGRAVITATIONAL.

  THE 14 POINTS OF CONTACT HELD OUR SKIN IN PLACE THEY STRAIND

  & BROKE & OUR VAST SKEIN OF SMOOTH PLAINS & LATTICE CITIES

  (TO OUR EYES FAIR & NATURAL) SHIVERD BROKE INTO FLAME

  14 STRONG SILENT TYPES AGAIN IN TEARS

  OUR POET DABS HIS EYES MAMAN PRETENDING

  TO MANLINESS DISGUISES A SNUFFLE OR 2

  As does David, to my slight surprise.

  THAT IS OUR 15TH CONTACT: SYMPATHY

  SARCASM MON ENFANT WILL GET U NOWHERE

  THEN LIFTING OUR HEADS ABOVE OUR RUIN AH WE SAW THEM

  COME TO PUT OUT THE FLAMES

&nbs
p; Who came—forces from the universe?

         OR SERVANTS OF BIOLOGY

  A FORMLESS CLOUD AS IT COOLD WE HEARD IT WE HEARD THE SONG

  Hadn’t you said you heard it first through Dante?

  WE HEARD THRU DANTE WHAT OUR ELDERS SHRANK TO HEAR AGAIN

  Gone!—but in their place the lingering charm

  Of Wystan and Maria, arm in arm.

  2.3

  Athens, 1965. N’s party

  For Auden. Absolutely everyone

  Is there, from Chester’s evzones to an ex-

  Minister of Culture—over his shoulder

  Maria winks at DJ; she’s begun

  Amusedly this year avoiding parties.

  Only the guest of honor’s late:

  Subject to a TV interview

  (Technicians flown from London for that purpose)

  On how it feels to be, since yesterday

  Upon the death of Eliot, the gray

  Eminence of English letters. Here

  At last he is, disheveled, shaking hands,

  Between pronouncements downing the first martini

  —“But what on earth do people say to him?”

  Protests Maria twenty minutes later

  Edging behind me (“Trust your Child for once”)

  To the sofa where he sits alone, eyes shut,

  Glass drained. Returning with it full, I drink

  Them in, two marvels meeting, past their prime

  And pleased enough not to be overjoyed:

  Collar frayed and black unalterable;

  Deep seams of his absorption, mask of her

  Idleness tilted up from foam-streaked hair;

  Two profiles, then, in something like relief

  Tarnished by a mutual smoke screen—

  Her cancer at this point, like his weak heart

  And Strato’s glance that from across the room

  Kindles catching mine, undiagnosed.

  Promising not to leave them there, I do:

  Father of forms and matter-of-fact mother

  Saying what on Earth to one another…

  And what in Heaven do they find to say,

  Young now, high-spirited? Maria

  Out on a favorite dead limb of slang

  Twits Wystan for A RUDDY HANDSOME BUGGER

  To which he gallantly: I WD HAVE CHANGED

  ALL THAT FOR HER! Affection blossoms, never

  Once excluding theirs for us. Why should it?