Shades of Parnassus

On returning to the Aegean intrigues

to find the gods having hoofed it, off away 

north-west with the sun, and the Athenians

illusive as ever, still inured towards 

the world’s peculiar affliction for marble, 

in flux of bewilderment as to when, if

ever we should expect them back.  

In this most ancient of places, Zeus’s tots, 

Antiquity’s reluctant midwives, 

measured dates by how long it took an olive 

to ripen. The genteelness of ruins, 

irregardless of how pronounced the enceinte 

expectations, were simply too much trouble 

to trouble over a day’s ouzos.  

Let the Calliphora buzzing about 

the gates fret out how to save Callirrhoë 

from the telemarketing plague of ships 

drifting about these azured waters. 

If Byron’s stillborns had time for rhymes, 

they had time to parse a restoration. 

Poems, like figs, grew almost anywhere. 

And how to argue this, to reason against 

reasoners weaned since reasoning’s genesis 

to the myriad of ways angels contested 

how many heads could be perched atop a pin? 

Had I the wisdom of Hesiod, nine nymphs, 

to steer a poet’s ship, perhaps I could seize 

some wave to navigate the hellish point?

Alas, I’ve only one wonky muse, 

a daughter too prone to the zither’s lullaby, 

flights of fancy. She can sing, and dance, 

tie yellow ribbons around the old oak tree --

for which I love her dearly -- but that love 

I fear holds the scantest charm, little 

to forfend the apatheist's aphasia. 

Since here, life is lived, and the dead left 

to slumber amidst the piecemealed 

aggregates -- so little time to truck

through fossils sifting for the whereabouts 

of those long departed mischief-makers --

I am on my own I fear, with all the other 

starving starlings, to find our wayward Olympiads. 

Ken e Bujold

Reviews

[emmajoygreen]

'Alas, I’ve only one wonky muse,
a daughter too prone to the zither’s lullaby,
flights of fancy. She can sing, and dance,
tie yellow ribbons around the old oak tree --
for which I love her dearly -- but that love
I fear holds the scantest charm, little
to forfend the apatheist's aphasia. '

The use of language and modern is incredible in your writing: 'wondering the root of 'wonky' for instance. (I await more information, sir) Whether or not the use of the Classics come natural to you or are etched on accessible stone.. My limp mind is now aching to research some or, actually, most of your references. Meantime, I am near to saying I feel invigorated.

[Ken e Bujold]

wonky :) such a grand word. with a rich and ancient history. derivative of old English wankel, which then morphed into wanky in the 1800s then to wonky. As for the classics, natural I don't know. But I did study them in U and have read my favs among them for a long long time. So know them well. How I weave them is through the lens of my fav modern writers, like Ashbery and Ashe and Donald Hall, James Merrill and MS Merwin, who have been reading a lot of lately. It all gets thrown in the soup as the other classic, the old crusty one, Ezra Pound used to say

Glad you enjoyed

[emmajoygreen]

Was/is a badly needed brain work-out! Names also noted.

[Betty Hermelee]

excellent write Ken, unfortunately I know little about mythology, but this certainly was a an amazing lesson for me, and even though i missed many words, I do know that this history lesson took place over thousands of years... and I enjoyed your style of writing... thank you professor/poet!
Warmly, B

[Ken Simm.]

Classic and whymisical across thousands of years. How do you manage that? Wonderful.

[Arundass TP]

Beautiful poem. Enjoyed well

[Akinlolu]

Intricately crafted with layers upon layers of masterful language intertwined with seemingly unending threads of mythology. I love it.

[W. Barrett Munn]

That is a fine read. There are terrific phrases turned but me being me was most enamored early on with the consonance of letter T. So much so that in my head I tried substituting “turn” for “ripen” when writing turns to olives.

Winston

[Ken e Bujold]

:) me being me the consonance of a letter needs to sit in the back seat and enjoy the ride as it were.
In all seriousness, I looked at the suggestion of "turn". While there is a certain twang to it, it doesn't, at least to my mind, pack the same punch as "ripen". In this particular case, the image has to be paramount. The play on food (dates/olives) requires it. 2ndly, and as important, the mood I am aiming at is that of modernity's rather short, shall we even say, infinitesimal attention span. which if you've ever had the experience of Greece and especially the Athenians you know what I mean. The marbles are moneymakers, nothing else. You will have to look far and wide to find an average denizen with even a rudimentary grasp of the classics.

[W. Barrett Munn]

Understood. I, on the other hand, would probably have doubled down with “olives’ colors to turn.”

Winston

[Ken e Bujold]

interesting thought: olives to turn envious. let it perc for a bit, as you well know i am never done with a poem or revisions until the ink dries on the published book.

[W. Barrett Munn]

Likewise I’m shoowur.

[W. Barrett Munn]

PS: I always hear EP in these situations: “LISTEN to the sound it makes”.

[Ken e Bujold]

yes. But EP was more subtle than you might think. Sound wasis more than just the audible. For EP it was also a stand in for instinct.

[W. Barrett Munn]

Good to know. I only know his book ABCs of Reading