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After Troy's Fire by Leonore Wilson
(three poems for Helen)
Difficult Dawn
Rustling aside unquiet drifts
and like the soul expanding,
a thundercloud a dubious wind—
And it woke me from sleep
this kindle of light,
seed of fire fire and embers—
And I heard the oaks and madrones
break with a siffling sound
like the manes of horses
lashing my face—
And in the blackened forest,
the swallow’s querulous song
as the whole riverbed
caught the flecks of ash
and my heart became a torn thing
at the edge
of the unthinkable.
Mythos
While we slept the flames grew
like sword-lilies on their stalks
diastolesystolecompelrepel
flames that started out small
like a deer’s tongue
a few deft strokes
splitting off panicles of barley
from fescue and wheat
as the flameskept circling
unsatisfied
as you pulled me
from the ramparts
and in the grey-afterwards
our dour home
fell on its haunches
as if giving birth
to a still-born child…
Fourth Dawn
And didn’t the sky whiten
like a goat-flock
and pitch-pines
in the grassy wrestling-rings
become wracked?
And wasn’t the sound like axes
honed on grindstones
as clouds bolted
from the near-and-far
like Hydra’s hundred snakes?
And didn’t the pelted hillsides
echo disorder’s slow tremolo
as lightning struck
the seeds of fire buried in flint?
And where did courage go,
did the plowshare take it
or the thrown-down gate
gelded with chains?
Didn’t the pearl of sun
become a blister
magenta moon, a cyst?
And the might-have-been
buzzed like a Homeric bee
as the springs dissolved
smelling of salt and rot
ember and ash.