Two Poems

Abstract

Two Poems GEORGE KALOGERIS Proteus I’m squeezing his hand, but he speaks another tongue. The word for his walking stick, like the hiss of the surf At our feet, is an eel so quick it could slither away With a single wriggle: kléetza. The breakers don’t move But the pebbles keep shifting places. If I had to guess, He must be as old as old Proteus himself. Very soon, I’m told, he’ll be going back to Greece. By now we’ve reached Seal Harbor, the end of the beach. I don’t yet know the names of the harbor islands But I think I know the myths. And the fog is lifting. I point to the islands and say the only thing I ever remember saying to him: Elláda. His name for home. He nods to me by the waves. In a week or so he’s gone. And then he’s the waves. arion 22.3 winter 2015 The Rowers Oblivious to everything but the beat of their oarlocks, Over and over they strike the dark night water’s surface Into swirls the quicksilver craft instinctively recoils from. The irresistible singers stand on a reef of bones. The rowers never look up. The doldrums are all around them. Across the Sirens’ mouths flows nightfall’s streaming hair. In the brightness bleached from their marrow the heaps of bones cry out To the writhing hero, whose wrists are cut by rawhide cords. The swaying mast is pointing to stars that sail above it. Beyond the midnight pull of the moon, the rowers bend Their rounded backs to their wooden blades. To them the currents Calling them home are dim as a kitchen’s fluorescent hum. Their ears are stopped with wax that is also the honey of Hyblos. two poems 100 ...