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Felice Casorati, La preghiera, 1914 circa, tempera su panno,
Galleria d’Arte Moderna Achille Forti |
Self-embrace on Silk Prayer
*With thanks to Hamlet-at-Sea of this incarnation, for being the final catalyst of my poem.
“Is it a blessing for a poet to be a natural poet-magnet?”
The romantic thinker wonders to herself.
‘Oh you Little Fool,’ she whispered,
A foolish thinker I am.
All these men, coming
in and out of me. All this pleasure and pain,
flickering like dying blue flames.
An instant garden trampled upon for hundreds of years
by those he loves with his Life—ah, such blasphemous
Beauty. An instant paradise turned
into the most exquisite ice ablaze.
A bruised garden amidst the flames.
The love and devotion that it takes to create
—such Beauty—
I can never fully comprehend.
Threads of a thousand hues are weaving themselves
in and out of each other; breathing esoteric,
breathing erotic, into
the weakest Bird of the most powerful strength—
A Bird without a name—
Can I be spared—Can I be
abstract like your patterns of this mesmerising nature, again?
I plead with my heart to be
as romantic and as abstract, like
your Little Brother, again.
Tears from the eyes of his heart are still rolling,
shining on my quill
like dews on those pink Oleander flowers—
falling, falling, fallen.
(And in case you were wondering, I was not speaking of
your little brother, I was speaking of
Mine. Like all these quests for Beauty and pleasure—I was
speaking, and thinking, of Mine.)
Breathing erotic. Breathing esoteric.
All these fiery blossoms burning way below sub-zero,
I could faint,
just listening to them.
+
*Title: from Mishima Yukio's last words:
“A small night storm blows
Saying ‘falling is the essence of a flower’
Preceding those who hesitate”
