Poem for the day...

The Spell Cast Over
by Jack Gilbert
October 22, 2007

In the old days we could see nakedness only

in the burlesque houses. In the lavish

theatres left over from vaudeville,

ruined in the Great Depression. What had been

grand gestures of huge chandeliers

and mythic heroes courting the goddess

on the ceiling. Now the chandeliers were grimy

and the ceilings hanging in tatters. It was

like the Russian aristocrats fleeing

the Revolution. Ending up as taxi-drivers

in Paris dressed in their worn-out elegance.

It was like that in the Pittsburgh of my days.

Old men of shabby clothes in the empty

seats at the Roxy Theatre dreaming

of the sumptuous headliners

slowly discarding layers of their

lavish gowns. Baring the secret

beauty to the men of their season.

The old men came from their one room

(with its single, forbidden gas range)

to watch the strippers. To remember what used

to be. Like the gray-haired men of Ilium

who waited each morning for Helen

to cross over to the temple in her light raiment.

The waning men longed to escape from the spell

cast over them by time. To escape the imprisoned

longing. To insist on dispensation. To see

their young hearts just one more time.

Those famous women like honeycombs. Women moving

to the old music again. That former grace of flesh.

The sheen of them in the sunlight, to watch

them walking by the sea.