10 Apr The Perpetual and Recurring Exile or, the Human Portrait
Posted at 13:08h
in Poems
Human power, that lonesome mortal project
Built on the heath of salt-fishers and morning-thistle
On that tilted fog lake he lets out a weary whistle
Beckoning some face of Pallas he wills to detect
This solemn, selfish invitation that beguiled its speaker
O treacherous nature who demands to dominate the weaker!
Human worm he is, whose blood is vermouth, viper-venomy
Unto now seeks to close the world in his hand inch by acre
Believing that if he believes by his own choice in a Maker
He becomes the enslaver of God and not His enemy
Such aesthetics reckons at best a lesser beauty tasted
But no beauty is ever wasted –––
Human reason to us proffers trade, unity for pride
Truly man neglects never a swollen intellect to obey
Gleeful captive is he who owes himself and cannot pay
Paradox-plucking, reason-ravished, devil-denied
Swirling incoherence unabsurd down death’s dribbling jaws
O foul fane of spectacles concocts for blood sans cause!
Human viscera, like lunar moth-wings carpeting the sea
Fashions above it wave and wealth, the spiritual tasks
Delusional man cast lots to portion his soul for his masks
That the invisible indivisible shall not multipartite be
Man loves his losing war on star-plumbed art with art debased
But beauty, by definition, cannot be a waste –––