Rosetta Stone
Three days of perfect sunshine, now seven overcast
Two moments of a heady spring, an eternity to last.
A cocky craning peacock, arresting yes but vain
Plain splendourless his plumage
But in deference to rain
Awoken now his flagging feet
A first hint of heaven’s drum
Enchants him with its throb and throng;
A dancer is become
Not far away a gawky girl has met the man of men
Damnable far yet deep within,
Guides scalpel, eye and pen
The honey needs more stirring in,
These stirrings stem from deeper
The dying one negotiates his sentence with the reaper
I’ve found it now! He cries with glee,
His loot unravelling spools
Oh all is lost! Alas!
Then grieves what’s found by only fools
To love is but to understand, to love is but to name
Tend tenderly to sprouting seed,
Let flourish without claim
Don’t water it nor give it light-
Be it yet withered dry?
Has your wandering gaze defeated you,
Outwatched by Horus’ eye?
Marcel he dreamed her in his arms,
A poison loathe to wean
Come morning all was memory,
Long gone his Albertine
I dreamed that you were in my arms,
Come morn when I awoke
You were but pixelled poetry,
Yet lingering smile to stoke
How shall these eyes be dimmed again,
That beauty holds aflame?
What hand be dealt to one with nought
But effort to its name?
Could we yet dress the day,
Exchange a word or two, or three
A gallant game of grappling ping pong table poetry
Time still perhaps for briefest quip
O’er quickest cup of tea.
Both doomed and decked
By twisted turns ‘fore even it began
This story of a silly girl that met a silly man.
– Nikita Jha, 2018
Image:
Prime, William C. “Boat Life In Egypt And Nubia.”, New York, 1874: 486.