Thursday, April 18, 2024

Yet another poem …

 … this one by me.


Elegy

In Memory of  Zelda

The aging princess presides

Over the ruin of the late king’s palace.

The dowager queen cannot help

But notice the walls give way,

The dust gather. The aging princess

Toasts her aging consort and complains.

Hounds bay among debris,  the moon

Opaquely shines through soiled panes.

The dowager queen listens and wanly smiles.

“A driving rain may streak,” she thinks,

“But never cleanse the windows,

Whether of house or soul. All

Gives way, nothing being done.

Time was, the princess danced

Beneath a moon effulgent, not opaque,

And children gamboled on the lawn.

The children now are fled

To regions where auroras dance instead.

How it will end seems clearer

Than the windowpanes, though when

Remains obscure, as always.” The aging princess

Takes her aging consort by the hand

And leads him in a halting sarabande.

The royal cats cry out, extend their claws.

The dowager queen listens and wanly smiles.


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