Desperate Adolescent, or Narcissus
was the fragrance of his beauty—
constant and sweet, the scent of heliotrope.
His task was only to behold himself.
Whatever emanated from him he loved back into himself.
He no longer drifted in the open wind,
but enclosed himself in a narrowing circle
and there, in its grip, he extinguished himself.
Uncollected Poems
Oh yes, I know what this is all about.
ReplyDeleteCould this be reckless blooming?
ReplyDeleteA feckless blooming, I'd say, inwardly to the point of disappearing. Interesting that the Rodin statue is so naked and revealing of this self-zippered soul ... the puer (or eternal youth) 'tis said to fly like Ganymede about the earth (so afraid is he of touching earth), loves his own stink,bleeds gorgeously and has an autistic inability to recognize the other. He's the one who is desperately in need of the influence of the senex, the other pole of the tandem, the wise old man who has entered history and paid those dues and grown a heart which loves the world. -Brendan
ReplyDeletemagnified eruption of self heat
ReplyDeletekabang
one sure momentary incineration
and then gone
water has a habit of doing that to fire.
(i had to separate rodin's adolescent from this in order to see Narcissus himself. considering the adolescent this becomes something entirely different for me. but that statue of the desperate adolescent, my god, i'd not go back to those particular incendiary times for anything!)
xo
erin
Love those last two lines.
ReplyDeletePG