And He Filled His Mouth With Pebbles,....

Eumaeus 617

The king remarked to the wind,

"what good is the boatman to the gatekeeper?"

in this elder country

no trade is without its nautical concern

from the start we sort

hearts of the unfortunate

and make sober the evil shirts of those

who need their competence explained

(not sufficient that I should know it- but

that you should know I know.)

Of course, you believe yourself to be

a wind merchant - a noticer of

vague creatures

who ought put stop to desire

and such matters of the soul.

Eumaeus 618

O, Galileo, now fingerless rememberer

of belief

you reached for god and were stirred by the sun

contrived you a business of differing

hearing the far horses of truth

you engineered accidents

and arranged the evidence

finally blind

you wrote us a demure sonata

celebrated in simple time

and we were annihilated by its possibility:

the moon is only an opinion

not shared by forgers

the fault, dear Mike, lies in our proverbs.

Eumaeus 619

Madam paid the madman

pianoplayer conspicuous by his

suggestion and observing the friendship of

useful knives

our point-blunt taken up and handeled

was to cut the wind

(or at least break it)

to be remunerated

for our stolen palace

to work against reason

to speak in a low voice

to collect the hands of wives

and to require a difference

between reflections and memory