Shepherd's Task

The words could drop and land
In intricate patterns,
Like the first rain drops
On a hot pavement,
Tracing intricate patterns
With obscure historical allusions,
Novel grammatical intrusions,
Terraced on a page -
All angles of confusion.

But why bother?

Time was when a man
Would seek to understand
A message as it ran
Across a page,
Finding in the words
Nothing strange,
Their straightforward motions
Tracing a man's notions
Of truth and beauty
Of god and time,
In simple rhyme.

A poet should know enough
To come in from the rain.
An unlikely leader of men,
He is called to lead again,
To lift our modern apprehension
And bring mysteries
Of the world and mind
Within man's comprehension.