A Secret Birth

     by Brett Rutherford

     After a Callimachus fragment, Aetia, 48

Three hundred Titan years old Kronos slept
while young Zeus and his enamor’d Hera
coupled without let-up, nights — and days, too!
Nectars narcotic they sent
     to the watchful and jealous father,
by the hands of garlanded Dryads,
and, from the lips of Iris, distracting
rumors of some trifles and petty strifes
whose answered he could delegate, then turn
his pillows over for another nap.

Then from Zeus’s labors
     and Hera’s womb’s machinery,
with clank and clatter,
     there came such a birth,
red-light the sky from pole to pole, a cry
as loud as a factory whistle, a smack
as of the first bright anvil, ever, struck
by the world’s first hammer, forged from ore.

Hera, whom Zeus hung upside down, cut cord
with her own sickle knife and cried the name
of their dear new Olympian:
“Hephaestos, the gods’ armory, be born!”

The Ox of Dryops

     by Brett Rutherford

     After a Fragment from Callimachus, Aetia, 24

Now Heracles, in company
of his young son, was slowed
when a thorn, which pierced
the boy’s tender foot
made him unable to walk.
The way was long, across
the plowed fields of Dryops,
and the solar disk seemed
uncommonly hot upon them.
Hungry and out of sorts,
young Hyllus tore at Heracles’ hair.

Just then came Thiodamus,
spindly on nimble feet,
yet still a mighty man
from the looks of him,
into the might hero’s sight.
Across the deep, dry fallow
the old man goaded on,
a ten-foot snapping pole
in one arm, a lazy brown ox.

Hailing the stranger, Heracles,
the generous donor of so many
deeds and labors, and once
he had praised the land and the fields,
and the beneficent orb
whose heat beat down upon them,
inquired, “I great pray a boon.
This wounded child calls out
for nourishment. If anything
your shoulder-bag can spare,
a mouse-size morsel, bread,
or a mouthful of fruit or nut,
would make our moving on
more swift, and quiet him.
I shall always remember you,
how amid your labors,
you were kind to another.”

The arrogant ox-herd
whipped out the floating pole
from ox-back to the very nose
of Heracles. “You, beggar,
and a fool to boot, know
ye not I am King of these parts?
Only a knave can claim
to hunger here. Pass on,
and may the burning noon
     finish you.” The King spat
and turned his back to them.

So what was a demi-god to do?
He seized the howling ox
and hurled it so far up
it looked no bigger than
a starling in silhouette,
and when it came down, its back
was broken. It bellowed. It died.

As Thiodamus fled
to summon his forces,
or hide beneath his blankets,
father and son devoured
the beast from tongue to tail.

Thus, ever and anon,
the uncharitable must pay.

Love Locks

Allegheny Cemetery Mausoleum Door. Photo by the author.

by Brett Rutherford

A blight
on urban bridges,
unwelcome as dead rats
or pigeon-droppings,
padlocks entwined
with chain-link fencing,
lipstick initialed
with names, initials,
swearing eternal love
as rust corrodes
and shifting fancies
make mockery
of mawkish vows.

Some vows are serious,
kept grudgingly
against the decades.
Though she is gone,
he plods along
until a second Mrs
love-locks him in.

And just in case,
the first wife's mausoleum
upon its barred door
has a double chain,
the sternest padlock
impervious to weather.

Old love is locked
securely in.
Better safe than sorry.

The Poor Man's Leviticus 3 - Burnt Offerings

by Brett Rutherford 

3

When the earth was young,
the even-younger gods
came down upon
the human altars smiting.
To watch was to die,
as flame and lightning
cindered up to ash
the living victims.
The gods consumed us,
bones and all.

Later, their appetites,
assuaged with human flattery,
demanded hecatombs
of cattle, sheep, and goats,
oxen piled up and laced
with a delicate frill of doves.
(In lean times, they were offered less.)

To watch was to die,
or so the priests maintained,
but there no longer came
the forked-down lightning,
nor did the thunder rend
the heavens at each god-feast.

Why did the priests now demand
a tithe of timber, and casks
of ever-more-flammable oil?

Why were the temple doors barred
after the slaughtered ox
no longer bled or trembled?
Why did the limp pile
of lambs and turtledoves
just lie there, unbitten
if those above were hungry?

Don’t peek, the priests would say.
Our kinder Lord
     wants only the entrails
anyway. Some days
the mere scent of a burning ox
suffices. Are we not blessed?

Don’t peek, the poor are told
(for they are easily agitated),
as the priests and their families
enjoy their roast-beef dinners.
It is hard work, they insist
to keep the smiting heavens up
and about their heavenly business,
and to leave us poor sinners alone.

Poe and Mrs. Whitman Come to Life in Providence - A Flashback to 1987

Illustrations by Richard Sardinha

 

This note was mailed to various friends in January, 1987:

January 1987 began in dreary Providence with the at-long-last publication of my novel, Piper. Zebra Books issued it at the very end of December, with a splendid cover that has induced booksellers to give it very prominent display. I have seen it everywhere — Walden Books, B. Dalton, Barnes and Noble, drugstores, supermarkets, discount stores, you name it. The few disinterested readers I've heard from seemed to like it.

Even better news is that the publisher loves the book and wants to make a deal to do two more-the second of which would be a hardcover with major national publicity and advertising. So, things are hopping on the fiction front, even if the royalties won't start coming until July.

The most exciting event in January was the publication of the new Poet's Press edition, Last Flowers: The Romance Poems of Edgar Allan Poe and Sarah Helen Whitman. The publishing party was no less than a dramatic recreation of the thwarted romance of Poe and the Rhode Island poetess, in a play by Norman George called Poe and Mrs. Whitman: A Memoir. The one-hour, one act play was performed twice on January 24 to a total of 260 attendees in the very room in the Providence Athenaeum library where Poe and Helen met and courted. The library reading room was transformed into a little theatre with a very atmospheric set. Excellent lighting, costumes and makeup made the time-travel to Poe's era most convincing. Helen recounted her romance with Poe in an 1860 visit to the library, and Poe appeared as a ghost, reading "The Raven," "Annabel Lee," and selections from his lectures and criticisms.

The performance by actor Norman George, who tours nationally with his one man show, Poe...Alone, was electrifying. The actress who performed Helen, who shall remain nameless, did not, alas, do justice to Norman's fine script. Large sections of the script were omitted in shocking memory lapses by the starlet. In the second performance, the audience sat stunned as she introduced herself twice, froze, and then said, "Excuse me, I'll be back in a moment." The actress was gone, Poe was hidden behind a curtain, and the audience stared at an empty stage. Moments passed. We waited for the sound of a gunshot, the thud of a body hitting the floor, the slam of a distant door as the distracted actress fled to the street. But no, she came back and acquitted herself, performing most of the script. A close call, and a harrowing moment for your intrepid publisher. (One can only imagine how the actor/playwright felt behind the curtain!) If we do the show again, it may be with Muppets, with Kermit the Frog as Poe, Miss Piggy as Helen, and Gonzo as The Raven.

Most viewers of the play did not perceive these production problems to the extent that we did, of course. There was generous applause, and strong interest in Poe and Helen was generated. Sales of the book were brisk.

And now to the book-the biggest and finest Poet's Press edition ever.

More than 100 pages in 8-1/2 x 11 inches, the volume is printed on acid­-free paper and premieres my new type design, "Lenore,' in a generous eighteen-point size. The book opens with a 9,000-word essay by, as Miss Piggy would say, mo. The text is a garland of poems by Poe and Helen Whitman, recreating their romance and the decades after his death when she was his most ardent defender. (If Helen had not written a little book, Edgar Poe and His Critics, in 1860, you might not be reading Poe today, except perhaps in French.)

The book contains suitably Gothick illustrations in the form of a dozen drawings by Rhode Island fantasy illustrator Richard Sardinha. If you haven't ordered a copy of this very special book, I urge you to do so. It is the ne plus ultra of the 119 books done by The Poet's Press. I wish all of my friends could have been present for the atmospheric and festive premiere!

The Providence Athenaeum has mounted a month-long exhibition of their Poe and Helen materials, including Poe first editions and autographs-some really fine and precious materials. Included in the exhibit are the drawings for Last Flowers and a montage of working materials from the design of the Lenore type face. The show will run until February 21st and marks the first time a Poet's Press book has been used in a library or museum exhibition. Quite an honor and quite a thrill to see one's work under glass.

The local newspapers ran a number of excellent stories about the play and the book, and there was a radio interview with Mr. Poe and another one to come with the humble publisher. I'll also promote the book at readings in New York (Feb 1 at Chez Emilie Glen) and in May at North Adams State College (MA). 

Envy and Apollo (After Callimachus)

by Brett Rutherford

    After Callimachus, Hymn to Apollo

And Envy whispered
into Apollo’s ear,
“Who cares about the writer
     of mere epigrams?
What matters it that some comedian
     sends jokes into a thousand ears
         and laughter propagates
               like mushrooms gone mad
               in a spring sweat?
What matters is that someone swoons
    while playing a harpsichord
          or that high C’s bounce off
             the opera house balcony?

Give favor instead
     to only the grandest things:
arches imperial and gold pavilions,
fights to the death on an even bet,
treasures piled up beyond account,
and the kind of art that goes along
with a thousand-year reign.
Give favor instead to heroic sagas,
to lines that outlast
the tuning of the lyre,
to epics long-lined
and even longer-winded.
Embrace Hyperbole.
Bless nothing that’s not as big
as the world-girding Ocean.”

Apollo turned, and with one foot,
he stamped on Envy’s pretty neck,
just as he had once crushed
the mighty Python.
“Wide is the torrent wild
of the great Euphrates,”
the god explained
    to Vanity’s idiot daughter,
“Yet half its flow is silt and muck.
And not from any common flow
do priestesses fill Demeter’s bowl.
From one small stream
whose origin is a holy fountain
from there the best of waters come.

“Look here, at the world’s navel,
at the blessed spot of Delphi.
None come in chariots,
     but one by one, on foot,
         each must ascend and wait.
Do horns call out
     if something that calls itself
          a king arrives here? No!
Does some triumphal arch offend
     the sight of sea and cliff and sky?
Again, Envy, no.
That which is least, is best:
Greeks hurl their epigrams
as well as I my arrows.

“Temples may come and go.
No glint of gold spells out
my name upon the pediment.
One Doric column suffices."

Persilere's Daughter, Dead

by Brett Rutherford

     After Theocritus

Seven, just seven, when Fate
saw fit to hurl her down
to Hades! What do they say below
when a mere child comes among them?
Will she drink the black wine,
and will her young lips curl back
at the sour bite of cornelian cherries?
Will she have leave to search
for the infant brother preceding her,
himself not even three years old?

Nurse them, Persephone, and place
some honeyed water near them,
that they, poor bees, may slumber.
Send some consoling dream at least
to Persilere, their mother.

The Stranger's Tombstone

by Brett Rutherford

     After Theocritus

I did not live out my days.
Too young I died, among Greeks
who scorned my Syracusan accent.
Subsisted, I, and borrowed not:
small point of pride for a man,
but I did not return in triumph
to an arbor’d rest, and a grave
with native soil around me.
Here, even the gnawing worms
avoid my humble shroud and say
to one another, “A foreigner!”

An Ox-Herder's Holiday

by Brett Rutherford

     After Theocritus

Camped in the hills
to get away from it all,
on a leaf-bed hastily made,
the beauteous Daphnis slumbers.
Such arms, such legs, such line
of neck and shoulder
ought not be bared
beneath the snitching stars.

You might, at least, flap closed,
conceal yourself within that tent
so artfully constructed, but no,
the warm night air seduces.

No rest for you, fair Daphnis,
for wicked Pan has got your scent,
and not far off, Priapus springs
to full attention in his own lair,
and hearing the pan-pipe summons
primps all his attributes and dons
his yellow ivy garland. The game
is on as fleet-hoofed feet
bound this way and that
among the somnolent sheep.

Wake up! Wake up
and get away,
poor Daphnis. Sleep
holds you down,
while lust makes mighty leaps
in your direction. Oh, flee!
You’ve not a moment to lose.

The underbrush stirs.
The pipe of one
draws the tread of the other.
A long priapic shadow
precedes the intruders.
Flee, Daphnis! No lad
should have to endure
what they might do to you.
No witnesses, for even
the oxen will avert their eyes,
embarrassed.  Unless,
of course, you’d rather stay.
Unless all along
this is exactly what
you meant by camping out.

Muses the Roses Love

by Brett Rutherford

     After Theocritus, The Greek Anthology

Muses the roses love
and thyme grows thick
where nervous poets lean
into sweet-clotted air
around Mount Helicon,

but where I climb
for healing and inspiration,
pulling behind me
some reluctant goat
dumb to the sacrifice
ahead of him — there,
no simpering flowers bloom.

Bay trees, leaves dark and sharp
cover the cliff entire.
Delphi means business.
Apollo expects no less than blood
as the horned billy-goat
quelled by the branch he gnaws
would understand
if he had half a brain.

Hoax Epigrams

by Brett Rutherford

1
Memed, with a blue-sky
background, the unsigned
platitude soars.
Unclicked, unshared,
let the gilded pig
wallow.

2
Glad-handed and hugged
by a stranger, beware.
Winged wallets fly
when least expected.

3
Your grand-son calls.
Robbed and left stranded,
he needs some money wired.
You have no children.

4
I have made so many happy.
I gave the buxom Russian girls
who look for husbands
the millions I got
from a Nigerian plane crash.

5
Called time and again
with offers of above-ground
burial in some
purported mausoleum,
I finally blurt out, "Look,
we are already dead here.
Nestled in native earth,
we are vampires."

The Bachelor

by Brett Rutherford

    After a note by Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1836

I, unmarried and alone,
am the undertaker’s bane.

You, with your dozen offspring,
     have paid in advance
     for a dozen funerals.

With luck, what’s left of me
will feed only a solitary worm.

Free Will Is Best

by Brett Rutherford

     After a note by Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1838

Explaining her ever-
attentive spouse
to a friend-confidante:

It was quite some years ago,
you see — the two of us,
one at each end
     of the house, and one
at the other — my kitchen,
     his book-piled den.
Iron-willed we were
     in mutual detestation.
He might have taken an axe;
     I might have learned poisons.

Then quietly, discreet
as only a Boston lawyer knows how,
we were silently divorced.

So here we are.
He lives at his club.
He brings me gifts,
I give him favors.
Each day is a first —
     at will, the last.

It’s a great deal of fun
and keeps both priests
and hangman away.

Look, here he comes,
grinning with expectation.
Is that ruby? And only one?
I might just feign a migraine.
Look none the wiser, my dear.