Poem of the Week

On time, no less!

Stasis
June 22, 2008

In the woods of Ancient Greece,
any person foolish enough to
sit beside a stream waiting for a poem
to drift by on the lazy current
would surely be turned into some
nimble, exotic plant, perfumed with
fruit, poisonous to the touch.

Those Greeks, poets included,
demanded men of action,
adventure, courage and wit.
Odysseus did not wait for Ithaka
to sail to him, after all, and no
glory came to Achilles for watching
Patroklus wage war in borrowed armor.
Those heroes feast to this day
in the long grasses of the Elysian Fields
honored for deeds of doing, not waiting.

But as I sit here, nibbling my pencil
to a nub, the taste of cedar on my tongue,
I think that neither the gloom of Hades
nor the flowers of the Elysian Fields
can match the reward of an eternity
spent on the banks of a sleepy river,
enchanting, fragrant, and deadly.