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About This Author
My name is Joy, and I love to write.
Why poetry, here? Because poetry uplifts its writer, and if she is lucky enough, her readers, too. Around us, so many objects abound to write about. Once a poet starts with a smallest, most trivial object, he shall discover that his pen will spill out what is most delicate or most majestic hidden inside him. Since the classics sometimes dealt with lofty subjects with a lofty language, a person with poetry in his soul may incline to emulate that. That is understandable. Poetry does that to a person: it enlarges the soul and gives it wings. Yet, to really soar, a poet needs to take off from the ground.
 
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Marpessa, My Friend Marpessa
As the daughter of the river god, Marpessa was a divine Aetolian princess. She was loved by two beings: one the god Apollo, the other the mortal Idas. When Zeus allowed Marpessa to choose between Apollo and Idas, she chose Idas, the mortal man.
You might have moved next door, Marpessa,
and we might have become best friends.
Then, neither your dazzling looks
nor my chain-link fence could divide us,
because I, too, fell for a man on shaky knees
but with a heart that breaks and knows worship.
You and I have sensed the arcane: to learn to live,
one had to know the mortal's woe. Thus,
you snubbed your godly heredity as if
it were a dreadful sin, and I never
held divine claims or even any lofty ones.
When the inks rinse away, Marpessa,
our poetry will stay, for in life,
vitality cannot be off-key but
love and storms intertwined;
As best friends, we might meet for coffee, Marpessa,
to weave smiles and words in the breakfast nook. Then,
while I offer you chocolate chip cookies, I might mumble:
"Don't let my homeliness or unkempt house
keep you away; after all,
we both treated ourselves to humans
to make the universe briefly ours."
You might shrug and say:
"Neatness and beauty are just crumbs; you and I
opted for the mortal life, meager
though it is, so in death, we might know
we have lived; although,
Apollo's connections dash like lightning flashes
while Idas and Ned connect from synapse
to synapse…sometimes, not even that."
Then, we might both nod,
eye to eye.
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Prompt: Write a poem, free-style or formal if you wish, featuring a myth. Make the myth your own, personalizing it in some way. For example: If you pick Achilles, you might write about your own Achilles' heel.
You may choose any myth from the world of myths: Norse, Greek, Roman, Chinese, Sanskrit, Middle-Eastern etc.
It is up to you to refer to your myth in any way you choose; however, since myths and their versions are numerous, please give us a short paragraph summarizing the myth.
For reference to myths, you may choose to consult these sites, if you wish:
http://www.pantheon.org/areas/mythology/
http://www.mythology.org seem
http://www.mythweb.com/teachers/why/index.html
http://www.mythweb.com/
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© Copyright 2006 Joy (joycag at Writing.Com).
All rights reserved.
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