Old quatrain-train in his hero-dotage.

5

 
In far-off Scythia, little horse-bells tinkle
in the wind, among the effigies, circling
the terror-mounds.  Effeminate soothsayers
(Enarees) plait, unplait their strips of linden-bark.

 
Air flows clear across vast prairie.
Saskatchewan, maybe.  Rattling my old snake-
rattle now, one arm swerving the daylight-radius,
muttering around the square perimeter, hey-ey.

 
Behind the skeins of Henry pilots Enaree.
Under the eyelids, dreams, wind.  Clear light.
And the woman veering away as you pivot
yourself... back into mist... who be?

 
Shoulder hunched, brow intent, eyes
scouring earth... Amazon on foot?
River-nymph on shore?  After chariot-
wheel?  Lost where my flood rose...

 
I can't bring back one who never left.
So song goes blind, just air over grassland.
Word-rods, tempered - beholding, as they bend
cities to their will, how the frail grass-waves lift

 
in the wind.  Not to speak of the broken sun-
spoke, its expectant fling across that steep
last curve.  Servants glean what remains, sweep
up the dust, murmur, croon (... will be done)...

 
How the air-flood sweeps away my crumbling
babble - what's left of ribcage holds no sail.
Only oscillating, in a hangar, wired to a nail...
icon of garden-angelus (blue eyes trembling).