Vision

Vision

‘Those who cling to the Void, neglecting Compassion, will not free themselves from the snares of Existence.’

(Saraha)

My antique Roman vase was dropped and shattered.

With patient care, I mended it again,

And yet, for all my pains, it still looks battered,

Emperor and nymph seared by a jagged stain.

Some things are just too fragile to withstand

The clumsy fumbling of a bungling hand.

My ailing lover’s heart was one day broken.

The girl I’d given it to was penitent,

Yet there are words that should not have been spoken,

And letters that should never have been sent.

Most heartfelt love’s too fragile to withstand

Misguided missives from a careless hand.

‘Fate deals a crooked deck.’ This savage age

Had etched that precept deeply in my heart,

Along with: ‘All this world’s a showman’s stage

And we mere puppets, playing practiced parts.’

The upshot being, most of what we say

Is not the truth, but springs from what we play.

So she found nothing untoward in writing

Nine lengthy letters in as many days

To one she had just met. It was exciting

To have him flatter her with unctuous praise,

Till, climaxing,when he declared his need

In doggerel, she paused, then wrote: Agreed!

Was she afraid my love was almost over

And fearful that she could not cope alone,

So sought the shelter of a future lover

Who might well fill my place when I was gone?

A woman needs much more than reassurance

And lovers can be tangible insurance.

Or was she –young and beautiful – just flirting?

He was in love with her, or so she said,

Ashamed yet titillated, she was skirting

A well-worn track that led straight to his bed.

Smiling sardonically, he reeled her in,

While she, half hooked, thought she was netting him.

Not so!  The truth, bitter as cyanide,

Was simply that she’d fallen for him – hard!

For he had youth and good looks on his side,

A way with words and women, no holds barred.

A smooth, seductive narcissist whose friends

Could help her to attain her long-sought ends.

For days I waited for her to explain,

But she stayed silent, hidden in her schemes,

While mountebanks in suits, dim-witted, vain,

Posturing windbags plagued my troubled dreams.

Did she possess a secret predilection

For smooth-tongued sleaze- a dubious attraction?

Of course, he never told her he was married;

She took some pains never to mention me.

She knew her youth, her wit and beauty carried

A man away as swiftly as the sea,

And that no vows can stand when fierce ambition

Conspires with lust to storm a frail position.

‘A lot of things look better at a distance,’

McCarthy says, ‘The life you live, for one.’

Was this why she had offered no resistance

To emailed blandishments?  New York was fun

While life at home was drab and uninviting

And what potentially was hers, exciting.

Stoically, then, I offered to resign

Since both seemed clearly so intent on mate,

(Ousting a rival king was his design),

But then she wept and claimed malignant Fate

Had led me to read innocence as guilt,

For she loved me, not him. The tears she spilt!

Then I knew she spoke true – not from her crying

For tears are weapons women wield at will,

Nor by her words, for she could well be lying,

An art in which we all acquire some skill,

But rather by a Zen-like flash of insight,

Sheet lightning blazing through black clouds at midnight.

Whole centuries dropped away, burned by that flash.

I watched her weep, ringed by ancestral bones.

Twin lions flanked a tomb. She sifted ash

In brazen urns. Helios! The desert stones

Were bright with blood. Her ritual robe was rent

In mourning: then, where he had gone, she went.

‘The human face?’ said Blake.  ‘A furnace sealed.

The human heart?  A blacksmith’s glowing fire.’

Such four-fold vision!  For her acts revealed

A complex structure – like my funeral pyre,

And yet her remorseful tears fell like rain.

She lit the fire then put it out again.

‘After such knowledge, what forgiveness?’ All!

Eliot had erred; the more we comprehend

The less condemned. Unless we know our fall

Is in itself Illusion, then our end

 Brings forth no fruit, like sown seed in sand.

Compassion summarised is: “Understand!’

So how dare I play judge? I should defend

This victim of a nine-to-five affair

Remembering all her lonely, lost weekends,

Those long nights building castles in the air.

I hope her gentle heart will yet forgive

My thoughtless hands, mend me and let me live.

Epilogue:

Primeval Ocean, lord of many voices,

Once angry god, sleeps quietly at our feet.

The winter solstice!  Yet my heart rejoices

At what small light remains.  Cold waves repeat

Their everlasting OM.  As sun slides west

She turns to hold my hand, earth’s fleeting guest,

And watch sea birds sink darkly to their rest.

COPYRIGHT (C) 2010 J D FRODSHAM