The Satyr's Heart
Now I rest my head on the satyr's carved chest, The hollow where the heart would have been, if sandstone Had a heart, if a headless goat man could have a heart. His neck rises to a dull point, points upward To something long gone, elusive, and at his feet The small flowers swarm, earnest and sweet, a clamor Of white, a clamor of blue, and black the sweating soil They breed in...If I sit without moving, how quickly Things change, birds turning tricks in the trees, Colorless birds and those with color, the wind fingering The twigs, and the furred creatures doing whatever Furred creatures do. So, and so. There is the smell of fruit And the smell of wet coins. There is the sound of a bird Crying, and the sound of water that does not move... If I pick the dead iris? If I wave it above me Like a flag, a blazoned flag? My fanfare? Little fare with which I buy my way, making things brave? The way Now I bend over and with my foot turn up a stone, And there they are: the armies of pale creatures who Without cease or doubt sew the sweet sad earth.
From O Blessed Dark by Brigit Pegeen Kelly. Copyright © 2004 by Brigit Pegeen Kelly. Reprinted by permission of BOA Editions, Ltd. All rights reserved.