Counter-Poem (I)

Counter-Poem (I)


As many a summer – wardens
Of thy temples,

Sent countless suns upon thy beauty’s riches,
Thy nubile pictures I keep as priceless samples
Jarred in thy pristine garden,
Now plundered by forged ditches.

When questioned:
“Where all her young days’ splendor hid,
And where her glow was roofed by haze?”

I’ll answer:
“Just look who she is now, and what she relentlessly did,
While harvesting Good in her eyes’ blaze.”


And yet, thou couldst add:
“See my son—the Pelican in his youth?
He can toss on endless beauty – it shall always prove a deuce.”