TWO POEMS AFTER OVID

TWO POEMS AFTER OVID

TWO POEMS AFTER OVID

in a moment I was past the roots’ last reach
past seam & cinder-slag and the reeking
dark cradles of stars. Cold hands on my face.
 
Up there the field might blossom into flame;
wheat blight seep & stink like bloodshot eggs, but I
am just another bead of spawn gone down,
 
another slant of shade for evening’s husk.
Do you use the word ravished? Do you still imagine
flesh rent by thunder, the breath of a swan,
 
a ram’s brute advances; or do you recognize
his frail caress, now oxen drag their broken plows,
now turnips are skulls in the earth?

 
 and [Ceres] beat her breast & tore her hair. Where is she?
 
In the deep seam. In sulfur. In the marrow,
dust, onion-rustle, beetle\'s skin & cache of seed —
 
Lost calf in a dreamy well:
Bawling. Then quiet. Here I have
no lips no mouth no tongue to speak with
 
Lost daughter who the mothers call down rows of days —
I forget the upper air. I drink the dirt
will you find me
 
when winter wants its draught of pollen
when the plow is crossed with rust
will you push the earth aside