Of that Joy of Love’s Random Consonance

 

Of music before everything—

And for this like the Odd more—

Vaguer and more melting in air,

Without anything in it which weighs or arrests.

Paul Verlaine, “Art Poétique,” tr. Eli Siegel

 

For love true is, indeed, odd

and without weighs or stops

even when pitting flute to horn,

and so, stirring rings of rhymes

 

and winding sparks which give

a lift to eyes, to breath, to heart,

along with a passing touch or

to something small, be it nothing

 

but a plumelike wink or a little talk.

But for such resonance to concur

and match, the terminus, the πέρας

 

(or Piraeus) must always be or come

sufficiently nearby for rhyme to rise—

unless immortal is one, or somehow both.