Showing posts with label Raab. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Raab. Show all posts

4/27/18

The Sirens - Lawrence Raab

After a while we got tired of singing.
One morning out on the rocks
with not a ship in sight, we all felt it—

a certain weariness, a malaise,
if you will. We felt it together,
sympathy having become

one of the finer aspects
of our nature. We’ve drifted apart
since those days, yet we’re happy

being remembered as impossible
to resist. The legends used to claim
we knew the future as well—all things

which shall be hereafter upon the earth,
as our song put it. Everyone only assumed
we were beautiful. But we were, and are,

though not unlike so many other
women now, those who promise much less,
but let you live. It was a relief

to give up our powers willingly.
That didn’t happen often in our world,
where the gods went on amusing themselves

with their meddling, and the hero
plowed ahead, lashed to the mast,
dying to be tempted. Did we enjoy the clamor

of shipwreck? The cries of the disillusioned?
It was our job, our particular talent.
We weren’t supposed to want anything else.

11/19/16

REPLICAS - Lawrence Raab

We were tooling along in Fred’s old jalopy,
thrown off our game
because the directions to the lunatic asylum were confusing.
I decided not to mention how appropriate
getting lost might be, maybe later

having to battle the elements to stay alive.
I’d been reading the old myths
and liked to imagine sailing through the clashing rocks
with only an oar for a weapon,
which wasn’t the most useful idea since we were heading

south of Tampa, trying to find our old friend
Adam, who might be waiting for a visit.
On the other hand, I thought, and then recalled
Adam having said far too often: On the other hand––
a knife is up close and personal.

People didn’t like to hear that kind of thing,
but we were sure he meant no harm,
even if in fact he did. We figured by now
he’d have forgotten the dangerous inclinations
of his youth, those days when he insisted

we’d all been misled by the voices
in our heads, then turned into replicas
of the people we thought we were. “Of course,”
Adam explained, “certain men choose
to be tempted by sirens. Others just let it happen.”

I told Fred that last part made sense, or sounded
like it should. “Damn,” Fred replied,
having taken another wrong turn.
“Not every kind of craziness makes sense.
Believe me, you’ve got to draw the line somewhere.”

At first Adam was upset about being sent away,
but since then we’d heard
he’d grown accustomed to the quiet gardens
they let him putter about in. We imagined
him kneeling down in the soil

like his name-sake and weeding
something small and green,
wondering why he’d ever believed
what he had, or else why no one
had ever understood what he believed.

Or perhaps both thoughts vanished
while he concentrated on his task, half-listening
to the murmuring of the more distracted guests
as they explained to each other how easily
they had been deceived by their lives.