Danaë, Dacha, The Impossible Man & Other Poetry

By John H.B. Martin

Featured in New Lyre Summer 2022

Danaë 

We have been promised gold like this before …  
But, now it glows on trees, we can't ignore it.  
One day we'll harvest it … Or mine it, rather,  
the way we mine our minds with endless words  
to let the world know just how poor we are.  

But, now we merely look on it with wonder,  
it longs to fall into our hands … (Else cling 
onto its former glories, like the sun  
with all its gold, to these few trees, in lieu  
of some more final settlement with power.)  

Its gold is everywhere! Beneath our feet  
as well as high above our heads, or drifting  
towards the ground through ice-blue air, as if 
the sun itself were showering us with blessings,  
like gold leaf, say, or some more potent flour. 

Dacha 

“There lives the dearest freshness deep down things…”