Three Drabbles for Three Days

Knowing

For Edith Hamilton

It has all been accounted for. The children of unwed mothers we know are sired by Apollo and Zeus, who can no more be blamed than they can be refused.

It is how we know when the mountain sends rocks of flame that Pele is in a molten rage against her lover. She has seen his eyes on another woman.

It is how we know that long ago Mosquito asked Ear for her hand in marriage, and though she did not consent still he comes by night to be near and to speak with her. And so you are sleepless.

Always Knew It Was You

For Sylvia Plath

You bastard

For what do I seek you?

Can you now give a little girl the love that is her right, her due?

Ich, Ich, Ich, Ich. To speak of you is to spit

I burn the photographs but still they rise in my mind,

They stick in my mind like glue

And you, Ach, Du,

You are stuck in my mind too

And your hometown, and your hometown

On the map a dozen or two

Wars could not raze them

Why war to raze you?

You have gone where I cannot find you

Still I will follow

And soon

Know and Believe

For John the apostle and Rilke the poet

“Believe in a love that is being stored up for you like an inheritance, and have faith that in this love there is a strength and a blessing so large that you can travel as far as you wish without having to step outside it.”
-Rainer Maria Rilke

What can we know of love

Wading through infinity?

Each day we learn to love

Each day what is to be learned expands

As if sent from a blast that started time

Was it not love that exploded us into being?

Doesn’t it ignite within us like the last great burst of a star?

And now when we are infinitely known, does it matter,

The distance?

From the furthest drifting of the universe I can see your incandescence

Hear your song

A song that is everything you

Yet is sung through you

As if you were both originator

And instrument