Parthenon

I used to write poetry when I was young

The verses sprung fully grown like the goddess of war

Ready to do battle with a world around me

That was oblivious to the enormity of my emotions.

I wielded each fragmented phrase

Like a flaming arrow

With no other intent

Save that each heart be lit

To the same burning intensity as my own.

You have to feel this!

I have been endowed the liquid fire

That flows through the inspired

And you will be moved or drowned in it.

I used to write poetry in the days when I felt everything

And could not filter the anguish from the joy

And could not implode and was not allowed to kill.

But along the way I found a channel

And diverted my strongest current's ebb and flow

To good works and strategic career initiatives.

A well contained series of locks and canals

Lifting and lowering men of steel

Who laud my victories but forget my name.

I have not rhymed in such a very long long time

Until I met again a seeker who touched my heart

In passing

And was far far gone when it burst inside me

A million fragments of a thousand stars

And through tears and sighs I began to write poetry again.

Because tonight I will not pretend to walk among the living

Unaffected by all that surrounds me

The dam has failed, the bow is drawn

Athena rises in the Parthenon.

Hope swells and levees breach every broken heart is listening

And till every arrow finds its home I refuse to love

Alone.

I will not be calm, and quiet and true in circumspect dignity

Lying to you but with phrase and meter

I boldly confess, I am undone and life is a mess.

Tomorrow I'll giggle and weep and then sigh

And look like a fool with my heart in my eyes

Emotion and life in battle entwined all for a lover who never was mine.

I used to write poetry when I was young

The verses grew, fully sprung like the goddess of war

From the shield of the King, a new sun has dawned

And a poet still sings in the Parthenon.