Coffee and leather armchairs, candlelit,
Card-playing in corners, glassware, jumping flames
In open fire places. Drinks to hand we sit
Watching the beards and spectacles at games.
Mount Carmel wine. The candlelight
Is gold and silver points on polished glasses.
Wall ornaments, china, tableware
The keepers of the passes.
Comfort. Mozart somewhere. A warm room
In a pleasant club-land scene.
The candle flame jumps before the faces
Of the card-players dressed in green.
A click of cards, a murmuring of voices,
A certain heightened feeling in this place.
Cold wind outside. Here, well warmed and tended
We watch each player’s face.
A snowy wind from hills of stone and mud.
We chatter with liqueurs, lingering thereon.
The candles flicker to the distant thud
Of guns in Lebanon.
No ambiguities, no ounce of doubt
In this Now at least, this moment pinned,
Gold and silver bubbles, thin bands of steel
With candles in the wind.
Dear Reader,
Can I be direct with you?
War abroad. Socialists on the rise. AI upending human life. Endless uproar online. The modern attention economy doesn’t want readers — it wants users enslaved to the tyranny of the present.
First Things is the antidote: literary excellence, timeless truths, and a fixed point of reference in a culture that has lost its bearings.
But we can’t do it without readers like you.
Our goal: Raise $150,000 by November 1 to sustain First Things in the year ahead.
Your gift anchors readers in the permanent things.
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If you have any questions or would like more information, please contact Giovanni Del Piero, Director of the Editor’s Circle, at gdelpiero@firstthings.com or 212-627-1985.
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