Self-Reflection
When I was young—
Seventeen in my dream was deathly sweet
On the green hills of willow boughs was I
Laying, pages of Ovidius
veil my naïve face
From trespassing sunshine—as did Daphne’s
Laurel skin from Apollo’s stretched arms
Yet I grew old—
And found time splits: Did when the Horais
Shoot the Cupid’s arrows misleadingly?
Speechless Daphne bursts for her lost arms
Bleeding on the winner’s bright forehead
Epics remains epics, praises perpetual for
Winners, while the Victimized crawl in shadow
So in my real seventeen, dearest moments
With through companionship as gifted bless
I again put my thumbs on Orwell’s page
Or Golding’s, Dickens’, Sartre’s, rather than
Austin’s or Bronte’s—all those rosy clouds
And read and wrote for the all worldly shadows
For bleeding Daphne, weeping Persephone
All those names on tangled threads
With not a shallow pity or empathy I write,
But in a total indifferent outburst—
Since only an apathy makes an objection grave.
Let Historia gloriously crowns the winners
Yet Poeta brims light on the forgotten ellipsis