PROLOGUE
FIGURES ON THE ROAD NEAR ABYDOS
How coy, how lascivious Helen really shone,
fretting alone in the fortress of beauty,
is of no concern to these coming stanzas.
Or how lenient to the frenzy of delight,
Hero from the stance of her squat tower,
scantily clad, by absolute will buttressed.
Reeling, endearing reeds of the valley road,
how lavish your gesture when we shiver
under a howling wind and dwindling stars!
***
Sitting on the porch in the dim reflection
of the work day, life amidst muted chores
calls local attention to some street lights.
I list those that failed long ago and those
that buzz and flicker with the inflections
of mosquitos, a fickle, forgotten desire
.
***
Peopled with figures of lions resting,
no more remains of a dream of pastures
but the acid backdrop of deciduous poplars.
Add a dash of red for poppies, dare a shade
of blue before the leaves veer to saffron,
let us wish colours that will not suffer.
***
We found a coin, nearly new and held it
with an ancient hand, so close to our eyes
we knocked once more on the bakers door.
The chance was he had sold the last loaf
but one; red chili was dangling nearby
and a flock of light clouds disbanding.
The foam of days no longer fools our sense
of being, a while, not aloof by the coast,
but deep in the muffled concert of things.
***
Maybe later on we can cycle to the crest,
we will order from the menu on the slate,
recover a taste for voice, acres of vista.
Suave water will trickle from the spring,
time is an entranced twig in the glass,
straight and stiff outward, twisted inside.
Time is but an illusion of its own class,
not our concern, not a threne of sirens,
it needs washing, with other edible roots.
The traffic of winds leaves it untouched,
time is the sister of the poem, the ring
and its stone, the bait of arrested twilight.
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