Metamorphosis

 

—Poetry by Tom Goff, Carmichael, CA

—Photos Courtesy of Public Domain

GOLDING AND OXFORD: The Book of Transformation
 
[I]ndeed an old religious uncle of mine taught me to speak,
who was in his youth an inland man…
                                  —As You Like It, Act 5, Scene 4

 
 
In “Shakespeare’s” plays, the Metamorphoses
Assume great sway: not only imagery
But whole strands of his plots; behind the frieze
Where players prance in low relief, we see
(It matters little, tragic play or comic)
Events grafted on scenarios from Ovid.
Actaeon is a favorite. Laconic
Pentameter seems to take on weight more gravid.
This dramatist pays the penalty for vision
Exposed to the naked bathing goddess Diana
(Read, Gloriana). Taints of court derision
Like those for an antlered cuckold, as lianas
Of vine and bracken tangle the ornate horns:
The curse of Metamorphosis unfolding.
Yet prior to all this, times of misty morns,
The candles guttering out, as uncle Golding
Shakes teen Edward awake: last night part vigil;
An ink snake trails from a nodding-off half-word
Last scribbled. Labor of love, not sterile Virgil
But fruitful Ovid, chased like the throbbing bird
Into the Latin shrubbery: quill’s the beater
Netting in uncle’s and nephew’s loose fourteeners
For bird an English Ovid, squire and eater
Of beef who girds his paunch with stories at dinners. 

 

 

 

 

FOR HUGH LLOYD GOFF
(6/12/1955-3/30/2021)
 
The big cliché, that everyone dies alone,
Applied to you with maximum deadly force.
The death certificate itself made moan
Complaining of no clear cause, no clear course
Of illness yet determined at the root
Of failure to awake. You simply lay
Abed, harsh clients and gentle in dispute
About how to roust you up into your day.
The oldest old plot point, the ambulance
Converted into a de facto hearse,
The blanket not to bare the face’s glance
But cover up the glaze, as if the curse
Of evil eye must be squelched at all cost,
All tempest erased, no glare from this one lost.
 
Could it be that your old, arrhythmic heart
Ruled shutdown, its last work or stroke of art?

 

 

 

 

 

PODCAST PANEL DISCUSSION
 
With kindly condescending admiration,
Four poet-critics batten on Millay’s
“I Shall Forget You Presently,” appraise
Her sonnet as they would knickknacks at auction.
Her taunt at lovers, those of brief duration,
Who merit “your little day, your little month,
Your little half a year,” are to the nth
Degree her types of discard, male-vexation
To be forgot: these panelists heed her word
But halfway, think her an actress voice, all pose.
What can they sense of hurt shut-lidded under
The tease they metaphrase, blind eyes or blurred
Where implicit scars ooze bled-thin afterflows,
Traps sprung on gamekeeper Vincent, after wonder?

 

 

 

 

 

YOUR WORD OF THE DAY IS:
METAMORPHOSED (imp. & p. p.)
 
I am my present self because I often
Was metamorphosed by what I saw then did,
Matured as my friends hinted I should open.
 
If I saw Greg sharpen pencils, I would sharpen,
Unscrew from a jar with his grip a too-tight lid.
I am my present self because I often
 
Would blend my view into any other’s vision,
Into throngs melt where those absorbed were hid,
Matured as my friends hinted I should open,
 
Though ignorant how their influence could darken
My core down deep where heated substance fled.
I am my present self because I often
 
Took on their leaf-surface, protective coloration,
To stalk with them, not to be food
            on which they fed,
Matured as my friends hinted I should open,
 
So often would I metamorphose, I had changed,
            hardened
Past process to product, stiffened till no blood bled.
I am my present self because I had often
Matured as my friends had hinted, back when
            I had opened.

________________________

Today’s LittleNip:

Butterflies are beautiful, but the process of emerging from the chrysalis and spreading your wings can hurt like fucking hell. But still, you will survive the transformation (over and over again) and you will fly. Remember this when it hurts the most. This is the metamorphosis, the going down to liquid, and the rising again. It’s no joke—but damn, it’s one hell of a journey.

―Jeanette LeBlanc

________________________

—Medusa, with thanks to the colorful, poetic butterfly that is Tom Goff!

 

 

 

Pupae During Metamorphosis
—Public Domain Photo Courtesy of Joseph Nolan, Stockton, CA

 

 

 

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