THE STRANGE FLOWER
 
                                                        (from Brian Wood’s drawing)
 
Plump taut-nippled
breast, slim penis
and a flower rising up
 
like a skullcap
on a rabbi with no
body but a line,
 
a curving line
and a line is all
a being needs
 
to go on being,
to follow fast
between the sexes
 
and reach that chapel
where no Grail is stored
but where the lepers gather
 
to worship a god
whose mercy is not evident,
but our rabbi bends
 
to tend their sores
and weeps his own
doubts away.
 
*
 
A line suffices,
is skillful
as no body could
 
answer every question
with kindly, meek
simplicity.

Robert Kelly