(For Bill Chisholm)
Thomas Lawrence Long
Beloved to you Phoebus Apollo
I give myself.
As a boy I played,
Innocent in your day’s eye
While you warmed my gangly legs
And scattered sparks through downy hair.
But one morning after wrestling flesh in the agon
And slippery with sweat
Resting on the field
I felt a strange heat
And every bone, sinew, muscle stretched to reach it.
I, Icarus, give myself to you
Fickle Phoebus Apollo,
Fly to you in an arc
On wings of my father’s waxy artifice
Soar to your searing penetrating eye
To your fingers of flame.
Song-god sing away my longing
Sing away the pain of your probing
Brighter than the Great Obelisk.
Now I do not swim in air merely
But heat holds, lifts me,
Runs through my hair
Grabs the curves behind me,
Draws me nearer.
We dance, pause, pivot
On the keystone pinnacle of day’s arch.
Feathers fall away
Sweet cloudy beeswax
Dribbles down my torso,
Down my thighs runs.
Phoebus
You are dimmer
Why a breeze,
Why does a chill pass my loins?
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