Il Principe and the Sylph

[smokingboot]

This has just turned up. It would take some excellent editing to make it a good poem, but I am not going to do that right now, or possibly ever. I have just let it pour out as it arrived. Part of it may have been triggered by a family member lovingly addressing me as Princesa this morning, and this odd memory I have of the word 'Principessa' being applied to me. Ever had a feeling that is so familiar but you can't quite recall why?

Anyway, the poem is not about me but Il Principe. I don't remember him but I kind of do. I love this about my dreamworlds! Often I can't tell where the heck anything has been or is going, but still, it's a good feeling. Cos I'm definitely a child of air.


I saw him in his house of tree roots
And the sea so close by
But he didn't go there,  
his sense of industry all gone, 
and the sky's breath never touching

Stacked dishes in the kitchen
Newspaper piles in corners of the house
A bath collecting dust and spiders

'Why aren't you here?'
No, ask rather 'where are you?
A gilded haunt at the Palazzo?
A mask drowned in the rain silvered canals? 
A red shade over bridges, endless bridges,
some better wine than this, by Christ!
And traffic backed up along the Via Maggio.
Rome perhaps? No, Rome will be other. 
You will need a different cunning there.
I will feel when you are in Rome

Belonging and not belonging.
Here, you do not belong
though you thought you would.
All these plates when you only need one
No-one else is paying
No-one else is playing
No-one else is here, not even me,
though I make the lights flicker now and then.

if someone called to you, 'Principe!'
Would you remember?
Would it be worth remembering?
Tiny flies in the sugar.
A dripping tap,the smell of old curtains
'è l'ora di svegliarsi!'

Thick thumbs dropped to your side,
slow breathing, those things they said
Those things will kill you. 
And one day you
One day   
Before I fly, a final gift.
The child of air sends it, 
a breath from the far off places 
Push yourself up, lift, move.
to the door that stands so mute
Out then to harbour and seagulls and no map, 
accept
that if the Royalty of Death disdains you
Life waits with winking eye and ruffian smile.

Comments

[bleodswean]

I like it!!! This especially is wonderfully done -

Belonging and not belonging.
Here, you do not belong
though you thought you would.
All these plates when you only need one

[smokingboot]

Thank you so much! It may need twiddling but that will have to wait a while.