James Merrill(1926–1995)
Arabian Night
Features unseen embers and tongs once worried,
bright as brass, cool, trim, of a depth to light his
way at least who, trusting mirages, finds in
them the oasis,
what went wrong You there in the mirror, did our
freshest page get sent to the Hall of Cobwebs
Or had Rime's Emir1 all along been merely
after your body
No reply. Then ("there'' of course, also) insight's
dazzle snaps at gloom, like a wick when first lit.
Look! on one quick heartstring glissando,2 stranger
kindles to father
thirty years a shade, yet whose traits (plus others
not so staring—loyalty, cynicism,
neophyte's pure heart in erotic mufti3
straight out of Baghdad)
solve the lifelong riddle: a face no longer
sought in dreams but worn as my own. Aladdin4
rubs his lamp—youth age—and the rival two beam
forth in one likeness.