No thirst to slake, nor itch to sin
no alacritous soul to fill a skin
nor bruited wavering strength within
For the high route march to Capel-y-ffin

Peppery footsteps gathering in
the sheep and the goats, the kith and kin,
the lost, the found and the steeped in gin
On the drunken road to Capel-y-ffin

Ten to make and the match to win
but the top is as bleak as original sin
and you wonder if it might take spin
from the Nursery End at Capel-y-ffin

The word-blank page is bible thin,
Is your parchment, chemotherical skin,
Is the point from which the dead begin
To bluff their way to Capel-y-ffin

Where they’re gilding a cage wherefore to pin
Ambivalent balancing angels in
Desire is down and the air is thin
at the fork in the road to Capel-y-ffin

So bed down now where all things begin,
In Yeats’s cymric bone shop twin
Further up and further in,
Beat the retreat to Capel-y-ffin

Jon Lever is a billionaire philanthropist, Nobel laureate, and wildly implausible liar. He publishes at the-electric-dark-age-hymnal.com