THE WINGS OF A DOVE

How much a stranger I am made to feel
By having to create an altar at which to kneel,
By having to build a place where to maintain,
Those forces, those strengths, that in me remain,
Strength without aim, force without form,
Vestigial vigour of the strong animal folorn.

There is only faith in the possibility of faith;
For when, almost unawares, I kneel, the wraith
To whom I bow has no one sense nor grace,
Only many shifting smiles upon an absent face.
Then the vital but unhappy desecration of that shrine,
Replaced by another barely considered god—for a time.

I feel forced to erect a constant illusion, required
To enable anything, good or evil, to be desired,
The necessary maintenance of belief in belief,
Driven by the knowledge that despair is no relief.
The ghosts of possibilities invade an impossible world:
Is there any dove whose wings are yet unfurled?