That Day in February

by Brett Rutherford

Pink cards arrived
with little hearts
and arrows.

Tomorrow
the senders come
to claim their victory.
peer over the edge
of an operating
theater, as I
am dissected
by tiny, long,
feather-fledged
scalpels.

Pink cards arrive
like individual hornets.
The hive follows,
an angry cloud
in which I sink,
a million stings
of insincere
affection.

I run. They fall
like meteors,
my fast feet trailed
by flaming craters.
Some cave
I crave
until the mail truck
is out of sight.

Unsent, the letter
I most require,
and dead its sender.
Unsent, another
from one who has quite
forgotten me.

Valentine's Day

by Brett Rutherford

The answer to everything
seems to be shooting.

Arrows in hearts
have brought me nothing
but misery. Worse yet
for poor Sebastian,
The Saint of Love
as it is actually
practiced.

Pink is a passing

hue, the moment before
the blood spurts out.

Deer dead,
air bags pierced,
substations shattered,
balloons plummeting,
lost kites targeted
by Tomahawk missiles;

even Eros, if he flew
to bring me good
tidings, is doomed,
a downed mallard
locked in the jaw
of a drooling hound.

Love is a bullet.
The grizzle-bearded
hunter rules the day.
Will you be my —
Splat.

Up in the Sky

by Brett Rutherford

The octagonal kite
I lost in 1952
has just been downed
by fighter jets
over Lake Huron.

Next, the umbrellas
(I count thirteen)
blown off in storms
will tumble down
from Jet Stream
to some cow-field.

The hat one hurricane
made off with:
include that, too.
The little girl's red
balloon, why not,
while you're at it?

Be sure a missile
obliterates
saucers malevolent,
whose occupants
disturb the herds
and vacuum up
hitch-hikers
for random
molesting.

Clean the skies!
Scramble the jets
when passing
laundry bags,
afloat in clouds,
set off the radar.

Light up the zenith
with fireworks,
and heaven help
high-flying eagles.

The Kind-Hearted Girl

by Brett Rutherford

     Adapted from Poseidippus, The Greek Anthology, v, 213

So poor, no more
than a hut she has.
Pythias is kind to strays.
Cats make a path
to her garden gate.
She names, and is known by
every dog outcast. I swear
she feeds the birds herself
from that dainty, open hand.

Is it any wonder
she seldom sleeps alone?
If no one is there tonight
I'd try my chances.
Invoking some god
or another for luck,
I'd tap at the entryway,
light as a hen-peck
or the faintest scratch
of a plaintive kitten.

Oh, she'd come running.
It's midnight out,
and raining, too.
I'd blurt some tale
of being tossed
from the tavern, and then,
the prey of thieves,
stripped to my last
farthing. See here,
even my sandal is torn!

With Eros behind me,
and Aphrodite before
to daze her eyes,
how can sweet Pythias
not open the door?

Oaks I Would Like to Know

Digital poster depicting King Offa's Oak

by Brett Rutherford

In Great Windsor Park,

King Offa's Oak

was said to shade

for rest and watering

a man and horse,

the latter unnamed,

the former a Norman

king called William.

A Flemish knight

named Ruderfyrde

brought news.

England was won.

Oaks big enough

in hollow trunk

to conceal a band

of outlaws.

The Major Oak

in Sherwood Forest

was one of these,

concealing, live,

one Robin Hood,

or dead, in larder,

the King's deer.

In Devon, nine dined

inside the Meavy Oak.

The self-same tree

at Wetherby

lets seventy men

and one distraught

old squirrel cram

into its dark insides.

Below the arms

of a Shelton oak,

a battle raged

between Prince Hal

and Hotspur.

One, Owen

Glendower, safe

in its leafy bower,

witnessed it all.

Oaks stout and fit

to serve as a gibbet.

Look there -- the Abbot

of Woburn dangled

at Henry VIII's order.

Oaks old and wise,

abundant with acorns:

what have they not seen,

what secrets not heard?

They lean, they bend,

they groan with cold and frost,

and yet they will not die.

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To Spring

Nature poems per se are rare in The Greek Anthology. This, one of Meleager’s longer poems, is an attempt at a nature poem, anticipating Virgil. It includes one biological error, the ancient belief that bees spring from rotting cow carcasses. I have done this up in blank verse, and if it mixes a little Shelley in, well, so be it. The Greek word “euoi” is  a variant of “evoe” or “evohe” and is a Dionysian cry of rapture. 

TO SPRING

 by Brett Rutherford

     Adapted from Meleager, The Greek Anthology, I, 363

The Cynic, too, is happy in springtime.
How could it be otherwise? Departed
the howling winter is, and now the sky
gives way to smiling, purple-flowered days.

Out of dark earth a green garland rises
as dried-up meadows break out in tresses,
willow green-bud, the tender, up-sprouting grass
the emerald hair of the new season. 

What had been frost is now the dew of dawn,
laughing as the rose-bud in lurid red
blushes. Shepherds break out their shrill-toned pipes
trimming and tuning them to summon forth

The he- and she-goats and their new-born kids.
Already mariners, by tide and moon
called out, puff up their sails with Zephyr’s help.
Somewhere on distant slopes, the revelers,

heads wreath’d with berry’d ivy cry euoi!
to him who blesses grapes: Dionysus!
An old bull-carcass spews forth the black bees,
decay engendering intelligence

as the swarm swells and divides its labors
as wondrous as the pyramids in Egypt.
those ever-refilling white honeycombs.
Kingfisher and cormorant, the ibis

and crane, stern eagle and high-flying kite —
how all the birds exult and sing, down to
the humblest of sparrow. Swan glides, swallow
flits round to bless the homes of rich and poor.

The mournful nightingale, in gloom of grove,
takes up its station. Dire ravens roost there,
and crowds of crows await the crops to come.
O what a world for those with pinion’d wings!

If there is joy in all green uprising,
if there is joy as gold wheat flourishes,
if there is joy in the flocks’ frolicking,
and in those never-ending Pan-pipe calls,

if there is joy in sailing out to sea,
then somewhere always dances Dionysus.
Birds, bees, the swelling earth, the cloud-blessed sky,
how should a poet not sing of these, too? 

Hands joined, come one and all, and dance! Euoi!

On the Porch

Ruins of Cyzicus in present-day Turkey.

by Brett Rutherford

     From Anon., The Greek Anthology, vi, 341

A ship-mast on a temple porch —
what business has it here?
Does the hill-top intend
a sea-voyage? No, citizens,
this antique jigger-mast
once stood at the rear
of a great trireme,
sail shading the rows
of sun-burnt oarsmen.

Warriors it carried
to glory and fame. Athena
herself designed it,
and thus, Cyzicus ranked
first in ship-building.

Rewarded this temple was,
first ever consecrated
this far to the East
to the Tritonian maid.

The ship, and drawn plans
for more like it, sailed
to Apollo in Delphi,
with offerings of gold.
Spartan ships splintered
before its thrust,
and Persians trembled
to see it coming.

Solider or sailor, nod
to the well-crafted ship
that brought your forebears
home in safety. Garland
the deck and give thanks
for safe passage
of Poseidon’s dark
and roiling sea.

 

 

The Tea-Pet Toad

by Brett Rutherford

The carved red toad,
mouth open just enough
to hold a single dime,
is a harbinger of wealth,
slow-earned, a tenth
of a dollar doled
out a thousand
thousand times,

the kind of fortune
earned only
by making, by hand,
ten thousand dumplings.

The poor batrachian,
I did not notice
until yesterday,
has only two legs,
a bit of tail
for a tripod
solidity. What of
his other legs?

For lack of dimes
did he sell them off
to a street vendor
whose frog-leg dainties
please the crowd?

That string of coins
slung over his shoulder
implies he should not be
that desperate.

His gem eyes glitter
a greedy ruby and say,
“No need for legs.
I need not leap at all.
Coins come to me,
and pale tea pours
from the heavens
to pool around me.”

Serene as Buddha,
wrinkled as sage,
squat on his I Ching
pedestal, King Toad
rules the tea table.

Night Torment

by Brett Rutherford

     Adapted from Asclepiades, The Greek Anthology, v, 189

A fool’s watch
on one of the year’s
longest nights, endless,
in winter weather, too!

I’m drenched with rain.
There’s no reward
for pacing back and forth
before a door
that never opens — hers.

Morning comes soon.
The mocking Pleaides,
warm in the arms
of one another,
are halfway up
from the horizon,
humming on through
the holes in the clouds. 

I know she is in there,
the sly deceiver.
Someone already came
and lies entwined
with her soft limbs.

What would I do,
anyway, if I saw
him leaving? Accost,
or slink away, or,
worst of all, knock
at her door and beg
my turn?

I know I am mad.
This is not love;
no honor here
for Aphrodite, not
the kind of affection
the gods bless. Lust,
simple and searing,
a hot arrow,
drives me on,
amid the winter chill,
tormenting fire.

An Unholy Trio

by Brett Rutherford

     Adapted from Asclepiades, The Greek Anthology, v, 161

Euphro, Thais
and Boidion, three hags
who once were courtesans
at Diomede’s tavern,
who formerly took on,
like a twenty-oared transport,
the desperate arriving captains,
have cast ashore now
three ruined men, stripped
to their sandals and worse off
than shipwrecked sailors.

Poor Agis,
poor Cleophon,
poor Antagoras:
the rocks of divorce
await them, and all
because those creatures
posed as respectable
women and lured them
to home and hearth.

Back at their old trade,
corsairs of Aphrodite,
they shriek like Sirens.

Snuff Out the Lamp

by Brett Rutherford

     Adapted from Asclepiades, The Greek Anthology, v, 150.

She made an oath one ought
not take in vain: Demeter’s
name she invoked in promising
to come to me tonight.
So much for Nico’s word.
The famous one is faithless,
it seems. It’s almost three
and I grow sleepy waiting.
Why did she promise so
earnestly? Do words
mean nothing at the end?

Go servant, and snuff out
the lamp left by the garden gate.
Now it would serve only thieves,
and there is no use wasting oil.

The Evil Song

by Brett Rutherford

     Adapted from Dioscorides, The Greek Anthology, v, 138

One song I cannot bear, and now
Athenion sings it night and day.
Like some neglected, stupid dog
he brays away
the tune of “The Horse.”

Down with his horse, I say,
and damn all horses in general.
I cannot bear the sound of hooves.
In my dreams, an evil animal
this is. All Troy is aflame,
and in that fire I perish.

Ten years of siege, I cursed
those Greeks, but in one night
we horse-mad Trojans died.

The First Anthologist

THE FIRST ANTHOLOGIST

     Adapted from Meleager, The Greek Anthology, iv, 1

This my memorial for all of time,
to my beloved Diocles I give,
not helmet, shield, or fleece of gold,
but poems garland-gathered, sweet
and noble, angry at gods and men,
swooning with unrequited love, full
of heaven’s bliss and Hades’ cold
comforts, flowers bound tight
with leaf and branch. Burn not,
my long-labored book! Set sail
on fair winds with many copies,
ye who thrill to beautiful words.

This was Meleager’s work. His own
lines are packed in immodestly
with the best of the best. Too few
the flowers of Sappho, but roses
they are! Lilies, Anyte and Moero
left us. Oh, the sad narcissus,
with the clear blue eyes and song
of Melanippides; a strong branch
of Simonides keeps it from falling.
The iris of Nossis, short-lived
but beloved of the busy bees.

Eros stopped by, and with his heat
the wax melted for all my
piled-up writing tablets; long
he distracted me, but the work
is done at last. Have I not turned
every temple-stone and epitaph
so that no good line was missed?

Herbs, too, mix in when flowers
are too fragile. The sweet crocuses
of Rhianus and Erinna crouch here
pale as unmolested maids. Alceus
left his hyacinth, like the self-same
beauty’s locks, Apollo’s tears.
Laurel, be sure, is there beneath,
the dark-leafed branch of Samius.

To last, my garland must be made
of sterner stuff than blossoms only.
Here Leonidas’s ivy cluster clings,
here the pine’s spiky needles hold
green forever the words of Mnasaclas.
A fist-full of plane leaves for Pamphilus,
all tangled up with walnut Pancrates.
Add to the rustling poplar of Tymnes,
all shading the sweet wild thyme below
where Nicias still tunes his lyre, wild
spurge enwraps Euphemus whose
words are not forgotten. Even the frail
violet of Damagetus is gently placed,
protected by the myrtle, sweet
Callimachus, whose words
are biting honey. The list goes on.

You may consult the book. I wove
the names one after another
into an elegaic garland. Even
Anacreon’s sweet lyrics flew in,
and a nameless poet, too, whose
name would not fit any meter.
A dash of ocean water went in
to stop the garland from going
stale. There came Antipater, red,
and a golden bough of Plato, too,
and other fine poets too many
to mention. Here they will peep
among the lilies and surprise you.

If I place here, for my own Muse
to honor, a smattering of spring’s
early-blooming white violets,
my little poems, can I be blamed?

Things most of you have read
and memorized, are here,
conjoined with works
the world has never seen before.

Welcome to my anthology.

 

[Note: Meleager’s long introduction to his Greek Anthology weaves in the name of at least two dozen more poets, but he clearly is running out of steam with the metaphor. I have therefore cut the list short, leaving enough of it here to demonstrate what the poet was attempting.]