THE OLD SATYR TO THE YOUNG PLATONIST

Go and get a monk for a lover, And let me quietly sit On this warm stone which the lichens cover. I have had enough of it! Did the high gods carve your polished flanks And make liquid your hazel eyes, That two should stand on a river’s banks And offer up the scurvy thanks Of being over wise? Let me alone. I have heard your tale, How Love is this and how Love is that. Is not milk still white in the pail And wine still red in the vat? I would have gathered you moschatel, Wood-spurge, wood-sorel, wood-saxifrage! When the moon rode forth I’d have taught you to tell Every star in her equipage! Because I’d loved you with satyr passion Were that a reason I should not keep Tenderness in my goat-foot fashion, And watch beside your sleep? The oldest of Centaurs is my brother— The wild wood-ways are in my blood— My mother was the great earth-mother— Yet I can love you as well as another For all my satyrhood! Go find your friend. I have pride of my own, But every noon I’ll sit On this warm lichen-covered stone, And perhaps you’ll come back to it! Perhaps when they talk of Love one day In their high platonic hall, You will curse their chatter and flee away And find your Satyr’s grave and say, “His love was best of all!”