As Only You Can

02 July 2025

https://poems.culturing.net/2025/07/as-only-you-can/

I have passed through the valley of Sirens,
and, tied to the mast, I could hear
what I wanted to hear. It is fine
to move on, to break free, from this strangest disease
we call love (although love like Proteus has many forms),
but this dalliance had not the flexible grace of Greece
but the harsh and inviolate law of Rome.
With the Good Book strapped to her girdle,
there was no way in for intrepid sailors like me.

Bon voyage, ma chérie. I salute you
in French, hoping some of its grace
(grown on top of Rome's soil) can inform
what must be a hard life, and make supple
what begs to be so. You are woman,
and I know you know what that means.
You must bend without breaking, receiving
the energies of just one man,
here on earth, not in heaven. They will not be
perfect, nor can you demand they be so,
but they will be yours to distribute as only you can.