Belfagor

Summers, facing east

at my window in the forest,

I watch light splash and freckle

crotch and stem and leaf-blade,

the badge and scar of it

trembling in the breeze.

Belfagor, Pan, Dionysus,

will you not come

and stand in that sun-warm

blazon of leaf mold

where always I expect you?

Will you not step forth

out of the teasing shadow,

resolve yourself at last

from light into matter?

Now I am gray with waiting,

like the ancient mask

of the doe's face

I saw turn toward me

at the forest's edge

in the perfect stillness,

ears and scut erect,

and her two fawns with her,

not in a sensual train

like something out of Bouguereau

with shrieking pipe and timbrel,

but simply vanishing

with the thrush's song

re-echoing from somewhere

deeper in the forest.

Will you not relent?

I call you once more: Come.

I will not last forever.

--Karl Kirchwey