Flowers
Following April showers
Following snows…
And then who knows
If, prim and perfect in her pose,
The street will not show me… a rose?
I do hereby abandon prose.
The yellow yonder on the sill
Is – yearningly – a daffodil
Presaging – but without replying –
The yellow of the dandelion.
Cascade of curves to crown their reed,
The orchid, too divine a weed,
Sprouts and then thrives without a need,
For beauty is without a Why.
– Why Y?
– Greek Y.
– Eternal Y:
The open gates to amplify –
– and hide – the truths that worlds can share…
But where? Will you dare? Will I dare
Approach a seething flame – the fire
Of ire entwined with the desire?
April 4, 2015
Baku
The Y – the “Greek i,” the French “i grecque” – in token commemoration of the Greek Ypsilon lost to the Latin alphabet, something I’ve been talking lots about to my English classes recently. This helps explain many words’ spelling in English – syllable, symbol, symphony… - but more crucially, it gestures toward the gates of Plato’s academy in ancient Greece, and the lasting mystery of understanding and of the crushing search for understanding. And that is how I got to the closing lines.