Lady of Sorrows

'think I finally satisfied with the Niobe Myth'

‘An hour, tops … two to the top.

You have shoes …?’

One of these young Turks, a gangly kid

I’d been advised spoke recognizable English

Recommended we make an early start of it --

‘Not so heaty then, fewer turistler …’

 

A day, and a half, later: when

He materialized like a grinning jinn

In the Sultan’s Kitchen -- all set

To head out on the belated excursion …

‘Pazar! No! We said Manday no? Tesi!

Yes…?’ Yes … Ok -- let’s go!

 

And so off (soon crammed into the back

Of a dilapidated dolmus) careening

Through the early morning

Raw light of antiquity’s undulating hills --

Like the very best of kardeş -- to oppugn  

The Olympiads at ground zero!

 

Ever since I read into the entanglement

Of earthborn pages seeking to explain

The capricious nature of heaven’s charges,

One killing-feast had gripped my imagination

More than any other -- the injustice of a misparsed

Sentence -- as too much of an aggression to countenance.

 

Why pride and hubris had been fused,

Affixed to a single catch-all indictment

To absolve the petty-minded vindictiveness

Of a goddess miffed over the bounteousness

Of an earthly womb, clashed against

The senses -- any thoughts of a divine philia.

 

How else to tell the tragic tale: to square

The circle of the noble daughter, wife

And mother, blessed by kingly father

Tantalos, so well loved by Thebes and

The mighty Amphion, against the brittle

Concubine so easily slighted.

 

Had Leto any cause beyond the obvious

Envy of another mother’s joy?

And Apollo, and Artemis so insecure

Amidst the Titan realm their only course

To honor was the wanton slaughter

Of a mother’s rival’s precious babes?

 

As we started to climb, up

Along the rutted hemline of junipers, wild

Tulips halloing to when the illustrious

Niobe’s brood had romped and roved

Before the reign of blood washed across,

The scent of grief, still unresolved, pressed down --

  

Determined to know the true nature of the heart

Inching towards her petrous gaze. Tranquil

Or incensed by the world’s blithe indifference

To passive sufferance -- if one of hers somehow

spared. Yes, yes, yes …. Though (mortal

I fear) still in flight from the gods ill-tempered whims.   

Ken e Bujold

 

Reviews

[W. Barrett Munn]

This is so very good with do many phrases that fill the mouth with pleasures of expression. A genuine howling good time.

Winston