I said to the wrinkled ashen boy
sprawled against the rock, hey Have I got
any prayer?
But Prometheus was dry as a cicada,
dead with a black tongue.

Rain plunged down like cathedral bells
and slandered itself against my skin
and steamed off his hot dead arms--his chain
sung against the stucco cliff
of my house which slacked its brows into
the mud and lathered there like a barren mare.

The oleanders shuddered fecund and smelling
white, rustling like dark colors against
the breathy gapes of rain and wind.
They purred against his glistening gray toes.

I creaked with thought
within the eyelid of the porch and
blundered into evening while
the footprints about his crumbling body
stippled away and I fumbled my way inside,
thewless, leaving
the oleander leaves jutting from his mouth.