Poem: I Believe in Art
by Jack Simons
Especially when Mozart or Bach
With complex musical reason
Inflame my spirit, and I catch the logic
Of holy counterpoint, and hear the heavens
Opening their eternity to my crabbed spirit,
I rise to meet the sun that has yet to show
Itself in the darkened horizon that blinds
Eyes to greater light and pleasures
Unknowable in a sweaty world of dry flesh –
Art that makes life a moving experience.
Perseus stands in Florence bowing his head
Over slain evil and bids me join him –
The one with elongated arms and neck
Who knows the reek of reptile blood –
The glory of gods congealed in bronze.
Like lightening from the Lord of Sabaoth,
Art shatters the crusty scabs of death
With fiery fury, pointing our way to a
World unseen, out there – beyond the
Dark, where light and joy live supreme.
