<> Unpublished Poems Greacen Estate 19 Jan Linen Hall Library Wednesday, March 16, 2016 TIFF Greacen007 Manuscript How the heralds trumpet English https://www.niliteraryarchive.com/content/greacen007 Linen Hall Library Linen Hall Library Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike CC BY-NC-SA https://www.niliteraryarchive.com/sites/default/files/Greacen007_0.jpg LHL Archive Now the Heralde Trumpet (Spring 1952) Now the heralde trumpet the glad triumphant news With gay abandon; the putty city faces brighten. Signal the message then - "Now it is spring!" - And write it everywhere. Sing it and dance it endlessly. Spring, alas, of soldiers on the move; the quick stroke Of steel tearing through village and over new-turned earth, Crushing the slow peasant faces, breaking the ploughs In this spring of liberation - meaning for the lucky A quick scorching death by petrol bomb!We dare not think of the unlucky. 0 bitter spring of man's long agony and fear. But for a moment escapist, consider in street or public garden The pink blossom icing of cherry tree gently smudging The lengthened, day with colour; acres of sky at evening, Serene, moving in silence to night’s still mystery; The lonely youth breaking his heart in secret love; The poet writing out his urgent but unheeded words. Yet, winter past, our boundless need remains, And we ask again for courage in a new season, That from our failing strength and near-despair May flow new hope, new certainty, new faith And - whisper the seditious word! new peace. Text