On Acrocorinth
Empty are the chambers of the courtesans,
a house of air; the north wind sucks
the energy from every creature there.
You seek the citadel of meaning,
find a broken carapace
echoing with howl and shrill:
a god-forsaken, ravaged place.
Where Pegasus took flight, winged seeds
spin in the gale's chill vortices;
beneath the bitter wind's blind will
a silence clamours with unease.
Aphrodite's courtesans, Saint Paul,
Venetians, Byzantines: their cosmos is
a vanished land, a country of the mind.