Orpheus Devises a Plan

My song hasn’t been put to use for years,
Not since I saved the crew of the fleecy ship —
The captain too — from that deathly chorus;
A soloist, new to my instrument, my
Baritone first won me historical pre-eminence.
Now look at me! I never travel anymore,
And fauns and dumb girls stare at me sheepishly;
I haven’t composed a tune or verse since — it can’t be! —
The competition at Thrace (how humbly then
I took the bough and saw her lovely face).
She’s gone and no one can do anything about that.
Perhaps now I can compose again without
Her constant pick-i-ness (“Here it’s too
Sad” and “There too poignant, dear”).
Why did she always want the poem to uplift, anyway?
One can raise a viper just so high.

She was never without one then, so
I’m certain she’ll have a plan now:
“Want to travel? Compose again? Then for art’s sake,
Come sing your songs to my captive audience. A
Spell could do it,” and she knows how I’d love
The challenge. I could pull it off, too.
I’d sing of how the bud was plucked before it ever
Bloomed, and how the flowers saw the rape of His own
Lady; then I’d play the changes heard lately in my mind.
How I’d love, just once, to bring tears to the old
Mortifier’s eyes. Of course, she’d want to come up with
Me, to climb back into my daylight world —
Return the favor, so to speak —
Anyway, it is a thought.