"berenices" poems
Partly to verify an era,
partly also to pass the time,
last night I picked up a collection
of Ptolemaic epigrams to read.
The plentiful praises and flatteries
for everyone are similar. They are all brilliant,
glorious, mighty, beneficent;
each of their enterprises the wisest.
If you talk of the women of that breed, they too,
all the Berenices and Cleopatras are admirable.
When I had managed to verify the era
I would have put the book away, had not a small
and insignificant mention of king Caesarion
immediately attracted my attention.....
Behold, you came with your vague
charm. In history only a few
lines are found about you,
and so I molded you more freely in my mind.
I molded you handsome and sentimental.
My art gives to your face
a dreamy compassionate beauty.
And so fully did I envision you,
that late last night, as my lamp
was going out -- I let go out on purpose --
I fancied that you entered my room,
it seemed that you stood before me; as you might have been
in vanquished Alexandria,
pale and tired, idealistic in your sorrow,
still hoping that they would pity you,
the wicked -- who whispered "Too many Caesars."
1.8k
each of these bruises its own galaxy
another candy bar will be named after
Apr 14, 2016
Apr 14, 2016 at 1:26 AM UTC
Let me open the door for you he insists, a kindness born
from misunderstandings of power and luxuries, like this,
Grab the handle and pull hard toward me. Standing dumb like a
stone easter-islanded headed fool, voice will out me, crackle of
Fury, but instead Why Thank You, honeys, sashays. Inside there’s
push off, rub off, get off, quick little deaths. Pebbles in my shoe.
No, that’s not how it goes. It goes like this:
Step out of time, skin suit fold carefully on the bed or the shore of
a river and now test the waters with toe stubbed broken.
Gentle there soft, marsh daubed clays, inanimate reeds brown, hollowed,
Place one gently between tongue and cheek. Sink into the river, tilt head
Breath through reed.
Can you imagine every day iterate? Repetition? Repeat the old rage?
Practice a minuet or tackle the sonnet form, line by line?
How does one get to Carnegie Hall? This too has become play, become fodder, become the one I am becoming.
Undone and I wish to step away, from the curb and push, push me under. A car, or truck or bus. Taxi me ferried to the farther shore. wait there.
Under my arm a fiddle case. Fumble the latch open and beautiful!
The gasp the wish the harm in lusting for want. Want and rage merry friends take hold and shove. I asked to be shoved and I am shoven. Small tiny violin plays angsty melody for me, pour moi, pourbois.
I will play for tips. I will play for your half of half uneaten sandwiches. Want and rage and rhyme. Meter has it in for me.
Half beats and internal lusts, magnetic poles attracting and repellent. I watch. My goal was to extract myself.
My goal was to be serene and write.
In the best case scenario:
Tonight’s sky lusted with Comae Berenices entwines two perspectives
that converge then diverge, with one asking how may I help you seemingly sincere and yet there is the price tag of submission, and the other accepts that rejecting this kind offer will precipitate another cascade of stars wishing them frantic, de-glowing each, as they fall from the clouds. May Day May Day May Day.
May 22, 2016
May 22, 2016 at 8:25 AM UTC