Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

TROY PARK: 6. PANDORA'S BOX, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Suave as music the long house seemed platformed
Last Line: Yet all that box held was a small thin letter.


SUAVE as music the long house seemed platformed
On the grassy clouds' wide landing stage
Where we could disembark with our plumed helms
From all the strangest voyages, the most plumeless
Flights. There was no Ind we did not know;
And the sharp prows of our beaked ships have scattered pearls like snow.

And always the wide windows were far open
And, perching on the sill was many a bird
Whose eyes were full of a long-unknown music --
Enchantment waking mortals never heard.
They whisper secrets to our ears, that fade
If they are caged in words. Upon these perilous
Landing stages were the softest bosquets,
Where in the Olympian heat, the mirage
Flowers and blazing fruits that ever glittered
Like a song, could fade into deep silence.

But in that great house was a little room
Far from the sound of the great gods feasting,
Or the sharp prows that scattered pearls like snow.
And on the walls was one small dark engraving --
A flat and feathered sea was staged above
A desert isle, and underneath, the words
"This is the Sea of Fortune, -- this the sea
You have not found." . . . But oh, on one dark day
Of summer, darker-plumaged than a harpy,
I crept to that small room . . . there was a box
(A flat thin sea that seemed a crystal box) . . .
And all the mad Cassandra tongues of birds
Cried "Troy is burning," -- there, outside the window. --
Yet all that box held was a small thin letter.





Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!


Other Poems of Interest...
Home: PoetryExplorer.net