Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Elegy for Ikarus






























The logs recede into the gleaming coals,
A mound of ash appears before my eyes
As I stare into the dying firelight,
Melancholy memories fade to gray.

It’s here my heart lives, in the blaze of day,
Beating beneath my ribs, soldiering on,
Despite the intense white inferno you
Kindle when you wound the ones I love best.

I step into twilight, feel Boreas
Blow lightly against my sweltering brow,
So sharp and crisp, cool relief, a balm for
The scorching gash beneath my grieving chest.

I waited for him among the chaste trees
Alongside the lush riverbed, silver
And grey with purple blossoms arching wide.
I waited though he never came to me.

Daedalus, borne on wings of your own scheme,
Merely to conceal your labyrinthine heart,
Your hubris obscuring my Ikarus
From me til I watched him plunge to the sea.




* artwork by Frank Frazetta