Achilles Me Thinks

A poem for John Berryman

John Berryman (1914-1972) Credit: Getty Images

Achilles Me Thinks

                for John Berryman (1914-1972)


There is me thinks
more than a bit 

of Poor Tom in Henry, 
Achilles-like in quest,

all for love bites 
as hard as hate, 

politics, poesy,
the lines that keep 

you up at night,
down in day, 

topsyturvy, they 
might call it, before 

they call it and as 
Epictetus advised

take their ball 
and go home. 

Home. Home? 
What was it Edgar, 

or was it Henry’s 
sidekick, the fat one,

confesses to audiences 
Whiles I may 'scape, 

I will preserve myself …
brought near to beast… 

elf all my hair in knots;
and with presented 

nakedness out-face
the winds and persecutions 

of the sky…  I 
nothing am.?

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TFP IS A PROUD MEMBER OF THE IOWA WRITERS COLLABORATIVE

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