At Dusk Is Mercury

Sometimes from a cloudless sky We hear thunder We see lightning We feel rain dropping down profusely It wets not lands It drowns seas Against surging waves Of the cascading blues While brimming rain- rich kelp onto the beach Clean and empty Winds blow to caress and displace trees And flowers beside nod and yield gracefully Assuming a mien to withstand distress quietly May not prevail upon Those disheveled hair and faces in seized Is it an act of that non-conforming breeze? Oh no, no, no, not at all They are working day and night like bees Ceaselessly even while we are resting Since the day we came into being In a small coterie of fleshy and bony flowers red and white like a family Tenanting conscientiously to synthesize life's symphony Without drifting from flower to flower to gather wines To set life roll on, sitting still in trance they are since Enthralling all to possess elixir for the queen Lodged in a hive that looks like a hermit of the sun Where love is born daily and once in a blue moon dies Now earnestly does the queen beseech to the esteemed Mercury, "Oh dear, breathe in and breathe in and out fairly For I am dying for the air You seem to be of ideals too austere for me When air is plenty and free But Her Majesty! Being ill aspected I am too sick to abide" At sea is the moon and listless is the Venus And the Mars declares war, Jupiter and Saturn look to the Moon For how long, how long can this culprit Be left to thrive upon therapeutic bribes The flowers wither and the love decays The queen flies away Leaving faces and broken hearts in anguish