Goodbye Apollo
Sad, that some dreams should disperse.
Lost perhaps with your going.
How can we bear this parting?
Us precious poets who’ve nursed you for so long,
who’ve seen in word and deed your glorious decline
know you have no home,
know, that like a disappearing shadow, you hurry
to be gone.
For it is long since suppliants came to Delphi,
Long since Sibyls sang your song.
Perhaps, in an ecstatic moment, some one of us
will feel your hand reach down and part the
centuries, feel you pass ghostlike through
the world, or see your flame, though flickering
dim, alight in a companions eyes ---------- then,
extinguished and forgotten; die.
We’ve proved unequal to your golden charm,
and many before have passed your way,
to lay in the collective grave of
tired and tarnished gods.
© James Rainsford 2011
Posted to One Stop Poetry in response to the photo prompt by Walter Parada.
Feedback is always very welcome and I'll try to respond to all who express their views. Please click on the comments tab below.
Feedback is always very welcome and I'll try to respond to all who express their views. Please click on the comments tab below.
well played james, we jump gods like ice cream flavors these days depending on who is selling what...smiles. i imagine many of the dead ones rolling over in those graves, groaning...
ReplyDeleteI'd definitely class the figure in the image as tarnished - or nightmarish! Not godlike in my eyes, but thank goodness your poem lent it a little beauty. :)
ReplyDeleteInteresting to think that gods could be "tired and tarnished", but you've painted exactly that, here. Well done as always.
ReplyDeleteI knew this particular post would not disappoint! As I read your words, I felt my mind opening up as all your ideas poured in. Such a thought-provoking and intellectual piece. My imagination thrilled at this particular image:
ReplyDeletesome one of us
will feel your hand reach down and part the
centuries...
and what a grand conclusion.
Many faith and gods have come and gone in the million years of Humanity's birth and those proud now will have a last as they had first believer
ReplyDeletegods come, gods go but we are left to make some sense of it. Like this perspective. The last lines are just great - what an image to take away from this poem.
ReplyDeleteApollo is a compelling figure,one of the ultimate symbols, and I think your poem expresses the void in our collective psyche that the death of that whole mythos has left us with. The feeling of sadness and loss is well conveyed.
ReplyDeleteInteresting take on the classics James, tarnished and tired gods, I think at this point in time they must be
ReplyDeleteBeautiful take on the prompt. Mythical gods and heroes had their share of flaws and were definitely tarnished -- loved the imagery of Apollo's hand parting centuries...awesome as always.
ReplyDeleteLike your sentiment penned here James. Poets do hold onto the past do they not??
ReplyDeleteCheers
"...Perhaps, in an ecstatic moment, some one of us
ReplyDeletewill feel your hand reach down and part the
centuries, feel you pass ghostlike through
the world, or see your flame, though flickering
dim, alight in a companions eyes ---------- then,
extinguished and forgotten; die..."
Great lines, James! I love the classic feeling you infuse into it, grand yet full of regret so fitting a farewell to a god.
"tired and tarnished gods."
ReplyDeletei've never considered gods getting tired. wonderful take on the prompt!
dani
Exemplary, classy.
ReplyDeleteI always look forward to your take on the prompts. I particularly love the image of the hand reaching down to part the centuries to bestow a momentary flicker of wonder on one of us. I'll keep hoping...
ReplyDelete