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Eight Poems Written While Traveling In Greece and Turkey, September 2003





Mount Ida Evokes Memories



J. Quinn Brisben 13 September 2003

I was too young to remember this,
But I have been told many times that I
Was introduced to the taste of home-made twelve
Year-old corn whiskey by my great-uncle Butch,
Who dipped a corner of a clean diaper in it
And let me chew on it when I fussed
While teething, the very last time
He was allowed to tend me unassisted,
But it worked and I slept like the babe
I was with a smile on my face as if I had
Tasted nectar of the gods, which I reckon I had.

I do recall the pretty blonde Doris,
Wife of my tallest cousin C. R., whose
Tummy bulged, and another cousin,
The huge and always comforting in a
Conspiratorial way George Streets,
Told me that Doris was that way because
She had swallowed a watermelon seed
That was growing inside her, but it turned out
To be Judy, born on my fifth birthday,
And never as much a playmate as I had hoped,
Because Doris and C. R. moved to Borger, Texas,
For his new job at the carbon black plant.

This morning as the ship picked up a pilot
And entered the Dardanelles, and I saw
Mount Ida in the distance where,
According to Homer, Hera seduced Zeus
In order to distract him though both knew
That what Nemesis decreed would happen anyhow,
And the flowers and grasses softly flourished
To cushion their epic godly entwining,
I recalled Uncle Butch and George Streets
And all the legends and myths of childhood
Which still amuse and teach and even
Comfort despite the sure approach of Nemesis.



Passing Lemnos



J. Quinn Brisben 15 SEP 2003

The Lemnian women tore their men to shreds
In Dionysian frenzy, needing aid
Repopulating Lemnos, Argus stayed
With Jason, Heracles, and crew that sheds
Their tunics and falls to on joyous beds,
Restoring balance; love and then evade
Is common practice in the hero trade;
The boys sail on, leave babies in their steads.

There is no treaty betwixt prick and brain,
No gender peace except one daily done
With new demands and tears and pain,
A full equality of mind but none
Of need, desire, and dream; we work and gain,
Then madness loses nearly all we’ve won.



Passing Lesbos



-J. Quinn Brisben, 15 September 2003

We are not making babies anymore
But married and despite Apostle Paul
Still burning now and then; we know the call
Of flesh, respect it as the lovely core
Of being, love our friends who have the more
Unusual tastes for intra-gender all-
In coupling, echoed in towering tall
Achievements in this isle’s poetic lore.

I do not know how real great Sappho was
Or if she really burned with love for girls
In ways that great religions bar because
We must confine our passions far from whirls
Of chaos: loving outlaws sacred laws,
And those who say so create costly pearls.



Passing Chios



J. Quinn Brisben, 15 September 2003

On craggy Chios grapes grow strong and sweet,
Old Aristophanes called Chians sots,
But out of wine and mastic gum came lots
Lots of silver, time for song and story, meat
Of rising human skill, a daring feat
In painted clay and chiseled stone and thoughts
Reducing primal fears and gods to noughts,
Until harsh war crushed greatness with its feet.

The massacres were fierce and exiles fled
Eventually to flourish in the shipping trade;
The pendulum stopped swinging and the red
Desire for blood browned out and hate decayed
To old crones keening for the fading dead
And legends of spring hills in blooms arrayed.



Passing Samos



J. Quinn Brisben. September 15, 2003

Polycrates had luck at least until
The Persians won and nailed him to a cross;
When warned to balance mounting gain with loss,
He threw a ring into the sea and still
The ring came back, for with his lucky toss
A big fish destined for the tyrant boss
Had gulped it down to feed fate’s foolish shill.

Greeks counted no one fortunate till life
Had stopped, not Croesus, Xerxes, or the men
Who nailed Polycrates, who win the strife
For now, but are betrayed and caught and then
Slit open with their very own fish knife;
The only question is exactly when.



Immortality



J. Quinn Brisben18 September 2003

“So my name will never be forgotten,”
The crazy little man told the people
Of Ephesus three hundred fifty-six
Years before our common era when
Asked why he had burned down
The great and famous temple of Artemis,
And he was right so far because
Destroying greatness is one sure way
Of getting your name at least
In the footnotes recounting greatness,
If greatness is remembered at all.
Herostratus of Ephesus was not well-formed
Or brave, wise, good, or even
Particularly terrifying except in being
Like minor poets and people in the streets
In wanting something beyond a few
Good laughs and thrills and sufficient meals;
He had that terrible thirst for forever,
So contrary to our basic nature,
For, if things are ever to improve,
We must get the hell out of the way;
Nevertheless, many choose to have faith:
“Believing what you know ain’t so,”
In words Mark Twain tried to distance,
Because the wrath of those who disbelieve
In their own sure death is fierce.
Fame is pretty much a shuck:
Human achievements are never eternal,
The work of millions is credited to one,
And those expecting credit and perfect
Justice mistake the ground they live on;
The temple Herostraus destroyed was
Replaced by a world wonder that is
Not there anymore except one rebuilt column;
Great Ephesus is abandoned and buried and
Will take another half millennium to dig out;
The names of brilliant artisans, sages,
Lovers, killers, merchants, whores, and
Others whose work we cannot even imagine
Are lost forever, and we smile at Herostratus
And fitfully, pedantically keep his name alive
Because we know him as our kin.




Patmos



J. Quinn Brisben, 19 September 2003

The earth shakes but the earthshaker
Is no longer worshipped, the old man
In his ninth decade hears the crack
Of the rough stone ceiling over
His head in the cool hollow
And hears it as a trumpet blast.

He came to this seahorse shaped
Bit of waterless land in chains
For denying earthshaker and emperor
In the name of a man who died
And somehow did not die, promising
To come again but has not yet.

The old man honored the one who called him
Beloved, took care of his mother,
Learned the subtle wisdom loving
Of the word-intoxicated Greeks of Ephesus,
Grew high-domed and white-whiskered
Waiting to join his martyred comrades.

Now he sees the transfigured God-Man
With glowing eyes and a message
For the seven churches of things
That are and hazy things to come;
He lies on the stone floor and dictates;
The old man dreams and the young man writes.



Oracles



J. Quinn Brisben 20 September 2003


My neighborhood is full of readers and advisors
And people who turn quickly to the Sun-Times horoscope;
The oldest things they dig up near the Hwang Ho
Are cracked bones that foretold a future now long past;
Revelations and Daniel have their cocksure interpreters,
And each new generation rediscovers Nostradamus.

Old Chicagoans are entitled to be skeptical about such things,
Recalling the 1948 DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN headline in the Trib,
Not to mention White House proclamations on the end of killing,
And the mayoral announcements on the coming reform of schools;
Right now my sports fan friends predict a Cubs-Sox World Series,
But predicting does not get it done in Chicago or anywhere.

In ancient Delphi you had to be pretty damned important
To get an oracle at all; you sacrificed an unblemished goat
With a bronze knife that must be destroyed each time and recycled,
Then, when you were properly purified and mystified,
Pythia would chew on the laurel and breathe in the fumes and make mumbling
Sounds and the Prophet would write a translation in regular meter.

Croesus of Libya, whose silver coinage had made him rich
And whose patronage of Thales and Solon had made him famous,
Was told that, if he attacked the Persians across the Alys,
A great empire would be destroyed; but it was his own,
For oracles are obscure, and what will happen will happen,
And the gods, who always welcome suckers, do not care.








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