When We Were Children

When we were children words were coloured

(harlot and murder were dark purple)

And language was a prism, the light

A conjured inlay on the grass,

Whose rays to-day are concentrated

And language grown a burning-glass.

When we were children Spring was easy,

Dousing our heads in suds of hawthorn

And scrambling the laburnum tree -

A breakfast for the gluttonous eye;

Whose winds and sweets have now forsaken

Lungs that are black, tongues that are dry.

Now we are older and our talents

Accredited to time and meaning,

To handsel joy requires a new

Shuffle of cards behind the brain

Where Meaning Shall remarry colour

And flowers be timeless once again.

-- Louis MacNeice, June 1944

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Sean Duffy provided technical assistance