A Spark of Laurel

This man, this poet, said,

"Tve carried in my head

For twenty years and more

Some lines you wrote before

I knew the meaning of

Euripides or love";

And gravely then intoned,

Lured from the underground

The greekness of my song

Still melancholy-young;

While she, long since forgotten,

For whom the song was written,

Burned wanton once again

Through centuries of rain,

Smiling, as she must do,

To keep her legend true,

And struck the mortal blow,

But not that blood could flow.

Ha! Once again I heard

The transubstantial word

That is not mine to speak

Unless I break, I break;

The spiral verb that weaves

Through the crystal of our lives,

Of myth and water made

And incoherent blood;

What sirens on the coast

Trilled to Ulysses lost,

And Agamemnon's thigh

Opened at length to cry:

This laurel-sparking rhyme

That we repeat in time

Until the fathers rest

On the inhuman breast

That is both fire and stone,

Mother and mistress, one.