The sonnet sequence, "My Human Disguise," of 600 ekphrastic poems, was begun February 2011 and completed January 15, 2022. It can be found beginning with the January 20, 2022 post and working backwards. Going forward are 20 poems called "Terzata," beginning on January 27, 2022. Thirty more Terzata can be found among the links on the right. A new series of dramatic monologues follows on the blog roll, followed by a series of formal poems, each based on a single word.
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
Jacob Wrestling With The Angel (Rembrandt)
#89
In my blindness after midnight I could not see
If the shade I wrestled was a man or woman.
I say shade but it was not without its own light,
Or shades of a color, like the edge of the sea
Is a million greens and the sand a million tans.
I wouldn't let go; you wouldn't call it a fight.
Our muscles were a conflict between oak and wind,
My hold was firm and unyielding, its holy grip
Gave but held; impatient, it wrenched my hip.
Was the pain meant to test the firmness of my mind?
As the sun rose, I said, "Bless me and I'll let go."
"I can," it said, "Now you know what you know."
I did not overcome God, as the angel said,
But myself. He knows me now. I am not afraid.
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