8.
Gold not doled him was despised.
"Challenges should be bite-sized,
Adventures pat and formulized."
Living seeds lurk under rinds
Eager, waiting to be peeled.
The scrolls unfurl, the clock unwinds
Each in its selected field;
The Fates sit on their fat behinds,
Their weekly maxims are revealed.
"But would
They? They should."
9.
How deeply ought we scrape through coats of paint
How many gray enameled strata down,
To scrub the mask through of an ersatz saint
To bare the chalkpate, bulbnosed clown,
Squashing the rings, folding the crown
Skinning this bleeding heart down to the bone
Finding a boraxed skeleton of his own?
10.
"Have you met my cistern, Brother?
This is where a lame ablution
Found in Rabelais and Lucian
Long ago was taught us by our mother.
"Effluvia per se can never move me.
And yet more deeply than MacBeth (in blood)
I feel I must, fundamentally
Dip into these mards to find the good
And beg the penalty that may improve me."
11.
Although his ancestors spread wide
Branches he could never tap his tree
For strength, or pith, or worth, or pride,
(Unravelled edges fret his tapestry).
Although so many warm Italians grappled, nesting,
His roots are buried—most uninteresting.
