Nocturne

by Brett Rutherford

Wordless, he came.

No knock, no bell,

no warning phone call.

The door just opened,

and there he stood.

Weary he was

from long traveling.

A backpack, overstuffed,

dropped to the floor.

As I said, "Welcome!

So many years!

Sit down for tea!"

he sat.

And tea was made, 

bread torn

by two strong hands,

fruit, yogurt, nuts,

whatever in hand

that required no stove

at three in the morning.

Not much was said.

He had been somewhere

you would not want to go,

and this is where he fled.

"Go back to sleep," he said.

He lay beside me, damp

with the storm he had walked in;

he smelled of ashes, lilac,

apples, and wild cherry.

Asleep, he wept.

He was half over me,

shuddering.

I tasted tears

and the cold rain

still rilled from off

the fringe of blond hair

that covered my face.

He jolted awake.

"I dreamt," he told me,

"and in my dream

I was with you,

and weeping.

And now I wake

and find myself here!"

I traced with one hand

upon his cheek,

the salt line of tears.

His hand stopped me,

covering mine,

as each of us made sure

the other was not

some phantom.

"Oh, stay!" I cried.

"Wake not somewhere

above and beyond

this moment!"

Wordless, he came.

The door just opened.

His backpack, overstuffed,

still sat in the kitchen.

He stayed — he stays.

He is here for keeps, he says.

no matter how many

years ago he died.

Gaze Not Upon Her

by Brett Rutherford

after Callimachus, Hymn V, 56-130

Whom the gods bless

     they also blast,

heedless of hurt

     and frail mortality.

What maid would not want

to be Athena’s girl-friend,

to idle afternoons

in sheltered forests, and dine

on fine fruit and ambrosia?

Even so, one nymph of Thebes

was beloved by Pallas.

Hither and yon, to Thespiae,

Corneia and Boetia,

she rode the goddess’s chariot.

In every place the maidens dallied,

inhaling the altar offerings

or watching the ritual dances,

favored Chariclo always led them.

Although a mother she was,

neither her son nor husband dared

be jealous of an immortals’ favor.

One day Athena led her,

overlooking Thebes,

to the sweet-water fountain

of Pegasus on Mount Helicon, 

where they undid their robes

and, never blushing, bathed.

In the stillness of noon,

     not even a bird sang —

O silence ominous

     in which the splash of water

and its spray alone prevailed.

If only some young huntsman,

oblivious of the place made holy,

had not come charging through

to the very brim of fountain,

high on his horse, and looking down

on the faces, breasts, and bellies —

all taken in, in one astonished

glance, by a  nearly beardless

boy, quiver and bow and fletched

arrows behind him lie an aureole

of tiny, angry spear-heads.

The hounds came up behind;

the horse reared, the young man

choked back his cry of astonishment.

Athena’s wrath flashed out as quick

as the glance of a Gorgon.

Just as a boiled egg goes white, 

so blanched the orbs of the intruder.

He fell to the ground, and only foam

came from his still-opened mouth.

Such is the punishment

for any mortal who looks upon

a god when he is uninvited.

Chariclo, wrapped fast in her discarded

robes, now rushed to hold the fallen youth.

Athena raged: “What thirst or madness

made you come up to this flowing madness,

servant of Thebes? Did some dire spirit

compel you and your dogs to ride this way?

Still he lay speechless. “What have you done,
Athena — goddess of power supreme! — you

must undo this very moment. Not servant

of my husband lies before you — ah, no! —

but his own son, my errant son, whom you,

the goddess, have blinded! ”

                                               “Foolhardy he

came, and he has seen the breast and body

of Athena, the closest thing to Zeus

that has ever ranged the earth and heavens.

That even one doe or one gazelle should fall

to an arrow while we bathe here in peace —”

Here the companion wailed aloud in grief.

“Sad hill, sad Helicon, sad Thebes! Goddess

of inhuman pride and malice! I’d give

a hecatomb of deer if I could this avert!

With this, you have destroyed my life. No more

shall I to this fountain come, but share

in the night eternal to which you curse my son.

No more have I to do with goddesses.”

With keening voice the nightingale might

study for a lesson in mourning, she fled,

leading the stiff and stumbling victim away.

Athena, startled, drew up her raiment,

and, putting on her Pallas-wise helmet,
the opposite of her war-like demeanor,

strode after them and spoke again.

“Take back, o noble lady, these angry words.

I did not will his blindness. Think you I love

to take the sight from some mother’s son?

This law goes back to Kronos and is inbuilt

into the interplay of Titan, god and man.

Those who look upon a god unbidden,

see not; as one who overhears the counsel

of gods is stricken deaf and mute. As fixed

into the scheme of things as threads of Fate

is this cruel law. My anger triggered it,

and I cannot call it back.”

                                          “Then I,”

Chariclo said, “must never look again

on she I loved beyond all others.” 

Her eyes she then averted, nevermore

to look on those grey orbs she cherished.

“I can do this, Chariclo, so that you may

not curse me and my memory entirely:

Know that your son shall honored be,

so that his name shall echo in history.

I will make him a seer whom poets name,

and when he speaks from deep inside

the well of wisdom and foresight I grant,

priests will kneel and kings tremble.

He shall know the birds and their omens,

from their mere shadow falling on

his otherwise unseeing eyes. An oracle

shall he be, and live to many years beyond

a normal human span. Boetia shall know him,

and Cadmus, and the Kings of Thebes.

His feet shall not stumble, for a seeing staff,

taller than his own head, shall he bear,

and it shall guide him on land and sea,

and when he joins the shades, he shall not

be there among the ones made sightless

or speechless by their own evil doings.

He shall dine at the table of great Hades.”

The goddess spoke, and bowed her head, by which

great sign her Father Zeus was likewise bound,

for this was the power he gave her, since

no mother gave her birth, but from the brow

of the mighty Olympian she was delivered.

Fitting that Wisdom had no mother, nor did

she stumble childish on the way to power.

With thunder above, Zeus gave assent.

Thus ever were Wisdom and Power

in true accord. Hail goddess, and hail

to Chariclo and her god-empowered son.

Where shall fame take him, and who

shall tremble when his low voice speaks

the truth that those with eyes deny?

Who shall know and hear Tiresias?

His Final Play

by Brett Rutherford

Nothing was right. The promised theater
was nothing but a drafty church, whose pews
a squirming, grumpy audience assured.

 The sets, by a master painter, were lost
when rising waters tipped a truck over
and pillars, statues, trees and all
were turned from plaster to rubbish.

 The props, the lights, the engine
made to carry the gods’ chariots
aloft, sank into a hole that suddenly
swallowed a Brooklyn warehouse.

 Costumes, at least, the actors had —
or so they thought — until the news came
of the all-day standoff between police
and terrorists, at the designer’s loft,

 nothing coming, nothing going
from Greenwich Village as sirens wailed
and helicopters circled overhead.
“No, sets, no props, no lights,”

 the prim director wailed. “How now
shall we go forward? “Street clothes!”
one actor chimed. “Naked!” said one.
“In underwear!” another insisted.

Reluctantly they all agreed to share
whatever items best suited the characters
they played, regardless of fit, like children
dressed from an attic trunk of castaways.

The audience assembled. The playwright,
afflicted with a sudden itch from knee
to ankle, kept scratching thereabouts
as he addressed the audience. Just then

the words were whispered in his ears
that two lead actors had amnesia
out of nowhere and not a word
could they speak without a script.

“A staged reading,” the playwright explained.
“You have all been invited to an intimate,
once-in-a-lifetime, behind-the-scenes
staged reading. Not to be repeated!”

They stirred, they grumbled, but they all
agreed, critics and all, to suffer out
the play’s performance. The actors
sat unmoving, except for soliloquies,

where they did dance about, and fall,
and rise again, as though possessed,
and they pulled it off – a triumph! 

Still did the playwright fuss and fidget.
The itching was unbearable, till
in the shadow of the back-of-stage
he lifted his trousers and peeked —

at stiff green stems and shiny leaves,
at sprouting yellow and purple flowers
growing this way and that from out
his living flesh. As tough as wood,

they would not break, nor would
the petals of the flower loosen.
He nearly fainted. The audience pressed
on every side, hands grasping his.

“The greatest drama ever!” a critic crowed.
“Shakespeare, Euripides, and thee!” one cried.
The beaming lead actors, their memories
now restored, fell to his arms and wept.

“Tomorrow,” a wealthy patron told him,
“we will order new sets, costumes, and all.
A theater on Broadway will be cleared for you.
This is the triumph of the era!”

The actress, Claudia, dear friend, he took aside,
and showed her the botanic horror, whose host
upon his calves and thighs had doubled.
“I need to see a doctor at once” What can this be?”

“You took a lover recently?” she asked.
He nodded. “He was special, wasn’t he?”
He nodded. “Oh, not some new disease, oh, no!”
Then Claudia took his hand and continued:

“No, not a disease, not really. Tell me of him.
Was he a lover extraordinaire?” He nodded.
“A lover surpassing all human lovers?”
Again he nodded. “Did he inspire this play?”

“Again and again yes. It was as though
his voice dictated everything. I felt as though
I had been written through, as though
I were seven feet tall and made of steel.”

“Well, then, my dear, you have been blessed
and blasted both. You have been Zeus’s lover,
and you have birthed a play with him.
All fine and good, but now Queen Hera knows.”

“He said he had a wife. I said it didn’t matter.
We were perfect together. Perfect! now this?
What have I done to merit some parasite
like mistletoe all over my beautiful legs?” —

“This is his way of saving you. You must have
read old Ovid’s stories. You’ll be dead
in twenty-four hours, transformed into
a beautiful shrub I shall plant to honor you.”

At this the playwright fainted, and the rest
remains at the Botanical Gardens to see.

 

Thelma, Then Irma

by Brett Rutherford

An old house it was,
brimful of overstuffed
sofas, side chairs
and love-seats.

When we came in,

boys of ten years and six,

Aunt Thelma leaped

into action. A drawer

flashed open, and white

embroidered doilies

flew onto every place

a child might sit.

"Wait! Wait!" she cried.

"No dirty necks allowed

against the sofa,

no dirty elbows

on the arms of chairs!"

We had to wait until

every surface was covered.

She flitted nervously

throughout our visit,

edging each vase away

from table edge,

a towel draped

over her thin arm

in case of spills.

Nervous she remained,

and nervouser still,

until they took her away

to Torrance, that place

they whispered about,

where the walls were doilies.

On our next visit,

Aunt Thelma had been replaced

by Aunt Irma,

her cousin whom one took to be

Irma's identical twin.

Uncle Ron was a cipher.

No word was said, nor questions

asked, about the prior Mrs.

The house was the same,

with every doily left

exactly as Thelma wanted them.

I swear the same

chrysanthemums

stood upright in the same

glass vase pushed back

so that no passing elbow

could dislodge it.

As we walked in, she rose,

and running to bar us,

Aunt Irma shrieked,

"No dirty necks allowed

on the white doilies!

No dirty elbows either!"

Barred from sitting,

we played on the porch,

ran off to a movie,

ate in the kitchen,

then slept on beds

whose crisp sheets crinkled

over some waterproof,

germ-free mattress.

Leaving, we trailed past

the doilies, the

never-changing

doilies, necks proudly

unwashed.

Street Scene

by Brett Rutherford

He knew these streets by heart,

and could, if blinded, find his way

through every winding lane

of the old city. Some things

were ever the same, others

as sudden as meteors,

such as the kohl-eyed woman,

just now, who offered him

a basket of figs and serpents,

lid lifted just far enough to show

forked tongues and amber eyes.

One lane, off to the east

of the Scribes' Alley, was empty

(was he that late?); another,

too near the sailors' dens,

was vacant, too. One turn,

then two, and then a third

and then he leaned to look

where two young men

squatted like beggars

in Alexandria's

most infamous alley.

One spoke, in Attic Greek

as pure as poetry,

"Hail, old man, if man you be.

You may choose between

the two of us, for no one else

is left of our brotherhood.

"Dionysius we serve, for silver."

The other, in coarser tone

coaxed him impatiently,

"What, why so choosy?

He doesn't want so much,

the pretty one, while I,

I charge a stiffer fee,

if you take my meaning.

The math is simple,

if you have a purse:

He charges by the night;

I, by the inch."

Callimachus,

out far too late,

or far too early,

judging by either moon or sun,

just shook his head and muttered,

"Neither!"

The Sleeper

 by Brett Rutherford

     after Callimachus, Epigram 64

Is your bed soft, Conopion?
Do you sleep well, and dreamless,
while I crouch chill in misery
on your cold porch? Not even
one thin blanket covers me.

Yes, I would keep you awake,
and not unpleasantly. Cruel one,
you feel not a jot of empathy,
as I shiver for your company.

A neighbor walks by and notices
my toss-and-turn on marble,
nothing but my own clothes
between me and bruising.

He shakes his head and mutters,
“Another fool! You waste your time
with this professional virgin!”
And then I think of your thin frame,
black hair that will soon enough
show veins of gray, and the day
when no one looks upon you twice.

Whose porch will you then sleep upon?

 

 

The Friend of Orestes

 by Brett Rutherford

     adapted from Callimachus, Epigram 60

What kind of man
would love Orestes?
Who, knowing his friend
must his step-father kill,
and then his mother,
would hand him the knife
and say, “Go do it?”

Such was Pylades.
He soothed the brow
of Orestes through all
his madness, slept next
to him in blasted wood
and caverns unlit,
flinched not
as Furies screeched,
and Hades’ judgment
hung over him.

A happy man, Orestes:
despite his madness
he clung to his friend
and never asked of him
the ultimate gift
of the inverted sword,
never once said,
“Friend, end my life!”

I had such a friend
and did not know it.
For all I know,
I had many Pylades,
but seldom saw
who was seeing me,
whose hands outstretched
would have eased my days.

I played one role
in but one drama.

The Shipwreck's Gravestone

 by Brett Rutherford

     after Callimachus 59 

As seagulls roam
the roaring sea, so sails
Leontichus, so seldom home
he hardly knows
     his many children.

’T was pity then,
that moved him
when an unknown sailor’s
corpse washed up
upon the mangling rocks.
Naked and nameless,
half his face gone,
they found him.

Leontichus took up
the pitiful remains
and put them here.
This stone his gift
not just for one,
but for all whom the sea
drowns and discards.

 Ocean, be kind!

Times Four

 by Brett Rutherford 

     after Callimachus, Epigram 53

Rival: if young Theocritus,
who is mine if only
for his many poems,
hates me, as you say he does,

four times as much
shall you hate him
and shun his company.
You hate all poets anyway.

But if Theocritus loves me,
as he protested earlier,
let that be multiplied by four,
to the heat of a burning star.

As Zeus had Ganymede,
fair-haired and ever-loving,
Theocritus, whose face
is fringed with a young man’s
first beard, shall be mine.

The gods will it.
I say no more.

 

He Comes Around

 by Brett Rutherford

     after Callimachus, Epigram 46

After his friends warned him,
“Callimachus is after you.
Don’t give him anything.
     Leave town, give no one
a forwarding address.”

 And so Menecrates, who said,
“I am not like that. Look not
that way upon my features,”
left town on June 20th. Then on
the holiday, what was it? the 10th
of the month following,
my door, unknocked, flew open.

The ox came to the plow
without a summons.
Well, well. A bow
to Hermes, the god
of sudden inspiration,
well done! Just twenty days
between the wish
and the arrival.

 

Suspicions

 by Brett Rutherford

     after Callimachus, Epigram 45

Don’t say I wasn’t warned,
old friend Menexenus.
No sooner had I said
I was done with doting,
along comes Pan, the sneaky one,
on a mission from Dionysius
to stir inside my ashes
     a hidden fire.

I thought I was beyond
distractions. A wall
was I, yet undermined
by hidden streams beneath.
So now I tremble, head
to foot, with dread,
that this unworthy lad,
a rent-boy if ever I saw one,
a purse-snatcher or worse,

dread that he slips in
where my heart is empty,
and something like love
floods in to overwhelm me.

Friends should rescue friends
who totter at the edge of folly.

Walking, Wounded

by Brett Rutherford 

     after Callimachus, Epigram 44

He sat among us bleeding,
     and we knew it not.
With sighs, the stranger
     nearly choked at dinner.
The wine he took, and swallowed,
     would not stay down,

 and when he left us,
     the garlands he wore —
as though he had just been
     at someone’s wedding —
shed onto paving-stones
their one-day faded petals,
     roseate.

 O what a tale
    he might have told us!
Burned by the gods he was.
He had loved
     where he was not supposed to,
          and then he had to flee.

 Being a thief of hearts myself,
my mirrored self in him I see.

 

Knowing Not Whom I Love, or Why

by Brett Rutherford 

     after Callimachus, Epigram 42 

Am I half-dead
or am I half-alive?
I know not which;
my soul is split
and I am heavy
with longing. Love’s end
is a small slice of Death,
so it is hard to tell.

Something between my
head and breast
has gone hollow.
Is there someone
I should be thinking of?

Is it one among those boys
I see too often already.
Have I not cautioned them,
as they circle my table —
the flirts! — “Don’t let me
fall in love with you!”

 What part of me, then,
sits here like a ghost,
giving out lovesick glances —
where, and to whom?
Knowing not who
has made me feel this way
is certain madness.

If this be not
a fore-taste of the tomb,
show me a face, at least,
or let me be put
into the market for stoning.