'One defense: The creative act'

 

“Against the ruin of the world, there is only one defense: the creative act.” – Kenneth Rexroth 

 

I've written before about Rexroth, considered “Father” of the so-called “Beat Movement” of the 1950s.   Rexroth extensively studied and emulated the poetic works of Ancient Greeks and writers from Asia and was a champion for American women poets.  For Saturday’s Poem here is Rexroth’s,

 

Yin and Yang

It is Spring once more in the Coast Range
Warm, perfumed, under the Easter moon.
The flowers are back in their places.
The birds are back in their usual trees.

The winter stars set in the ocean.
The summer stars rise from the mountains.
The air is filled with atoms of quicksilver.
Resurrection envelops the earth.

Goemetrical, blazing, deathless,
Animals and men march through heaven,
Pacing their secret ceremony.

The Lion gives the moon to the Virgin.
She stands at the crossroads of heaven,
Holding the full moon in her right hand,
A glittering wheat ear in her left.

The climax of the rite of rebirth
Has ascended from the underworld
Is proclaimed in light from the zenith.
In the underworld the sun swims
Between the fish called Yes and No.