Languages

THERE are no handles upon a language

  Whereby men take hold of it

  And mark it with signs for its remembrance.

  It is a river, this language,

  Once in a thousand years

  Breaking a new course

  Changing its way to the ocean.

  It is mountain effluvia

  Moving to valleys

 And from nation to nation

 Crossing borders and mixing.

 Languages die like rivers.

 Words wrapped round your tongue today

 And broken to shape of thought

 Between your teeth and lips speaking

 Now and today

 Shall be faded hieroglyphics

 Ten thousand years from now.

 Sing—and singing—remember

 Your song dies and changes

 And is not here to-morrow

 Any more than the wind

 Blowing ten thousand years ago.

Composition date is unknown - the above date represents the first publication date.The lyrical form of this poem is unrhyming.8.effluvia: streams flowing down from rainfall or snowmelt.