Hermione's return

MAYPOLE CALCULUS

The park bench by the Father of Waters

is Hobo Henry’s throne.

Where he comes to his own

like Leontes (late to his daughter’s

recovery, Hermione’s return).

That sidewinding father

plays hide-&-seek – with another

voice, another fleece.  Like someone

you met once, on the road to Emmaus

or St. Petersburg – sly

Queequeg, tricksy Bluejay...

warbling red Robin in burnoose

of raven-ink.  His tattoo labyrinth

the cave he trails from –

a smoky-flutey hum

folding the whole into a ninth

symphonic inning (end-beginning).

This personal boomerang

widens your gyre, bright Milky-

Zed – like a shadow slowly shrinking

toward your noon.  Come back again.

Global res publica

out of Exodus.  A prairie

equal sign, Mississippian –

grass salience across the river (Monk’s

Mound) still reminder

we were slaves once, here

(Dred Scott & Gateway Arch plunk

                     *

side by side).  Slaves kept by others,

& slaves to ourselves.

Whose arrogance resolves

into a Minotaur of rival brothers

(orange vs. black – harsh prison stripes

mirrored across scarce

monarchs, dense cedars).

Vlad in Kiev?  One of them types.

Or Nabokov, in camouflage.

A Frisco safety net

might bolt this Nut

who stretches out her flamande bridge

into an arch, over the Nile –

osprey transfigurement

of J to fundament

(her spirit flaming into smile).

This late romance, Leontes-Hobo –

some Pygmalion’s design –

lifted La Paix from Brooklyn

mud, with Liberté (moss-emerald glow).

Her incarnation of a crocus rose

& spun gold gyroscopes,

kalimba-periscopes –

around a Maypole calculus

of loving fingerprints, & penny-clues.

The Earth, in shadow of

one flighty Jonah-dove...

your arc of fellowship (King of the Blues).

5.1.17