Think ye on what might have been,
and dwell on the reminiscence of a passing prosperity,
which as a flaxen cloth is wrung,
passes to the obscurity of memory.
So sink to the shadows - ye might have been great.
Sigh and divulge the substance of your bodies,
rise, turn and stare.  The land groans,
from the labour of many, rises and falls,
to the beat of begetting and dying, while the begotten die,
and the dead beget some more,
to ache their heads and till their beds,
and carry on for a little while longer.  
I sat today and listened to the Angelus on the radio -
because what else was there to do?