Kalypso

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The canes up on the cliff
flash green and silver by the sea
but out of what is lost
grows something stronger next to me

an island in the sun tonight
I can snatch her talk
from the faint drone of the surf
though through the reeds I cannot walk

on a moonlit stretch of ocean
sand as white as bone
she floats with dreaming motions
with a sweetness there that grows

and her cheeks dusted
with a royal smile
and her gaze would look to sea
for ten thousand miles

on a silver coin
from royal memory.
a heart life is open to the sky
transparency

where the two midnights meet,
light floods the morning
and then the crystal sea,
a universe reborn

I am calypso
and i have lived alone
for ten thousand years
and ten thousand more

i saw her drowning
and i pulled her into me
into my island
into my holy sanctuary

now in the morning light
she will sail away
i can still feel her long hair
and taste the salt on her skin

She called me Monet
and left me with designs
that siezed the ramparts
and nearly blew my mind

she watched the water
for gravity and shapes
geometries would fall apart
we count together : one lake, two lakes, three lakes....

she was a flower
intricate pale blue
she moved in circles,
swaying thoughts and leaving clues

and the minor accidents
of love and lovers lost
and the harsh punctuality
with stunning cost

i am calypso
floating wreckage from the gods
i keep her here in my arching caves
beneath the eyes of mars

she has no ship nor oars nor crews
to take her off
the wide expanse of ocean
the waters to  be crossed


There was a time when the divine
Kalypso could strike fear
into the heart of every
fucking sailor who drew near

but times are tough for mortals
and the gods both
ain't that the truth
and that the screaming most?
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source:

 Homer, Odyssey 5. 296 ff :
"[As Odysseus is sailing from the island of Kalypso (Calypso), Poseidon sends a storm to sink his raft:] Then Odysseus felt his knees and his spirit quail; in desperation he

spoke to his own heroic heart: ‘Alas for me! What will become of me in the end? I fear the goddess [Kalypos] spoke all too truly when she prophesied of trouble on trouble to

bear at sea before I reached my own land. All this is now being brought to pass.’"

Homer, Odyssey 7. 243 ff :
"[Odysseus tells King Alkinous (Alcinous) of the Phaiakes (Phaeacians) of his travels:] Far from here there lies an island called Ogygia. The daughter of atlas has her home

there, Kalypso (Calypso), a goddess of awesome power and many wiles. She is seldom visited, whether by mortals or by immortals; but I, alas, was brought by ill fortune to her

hearth, a sole survivor when Zeus with his flashing thunderbolt shattered and shivered my rapid ship in the midst of the wine-dark ocean. There and then my good comreades

perished; for myself, I threw my arms round the vessel’s keel and was carried on for nine whole days; in the murkiness of the tenth night the gods brought me to Ogygia. The

goddess welcomed me lovingly, tended me, offered me immortality and eternal youth; yet she never won the heart within me. I remained with her for seven full years, and watered

with continual weeping the celestial garments that she gave me. But when the eighth year came circling round, she told me and urged me to return, perhaps because Zeus had sent

her warning, perhaps because her own mind had changed. So she sent me away on a firm raft, giving me many gifts, food and sweet wine, and clothing me in celestial garments;

moreover she sent a fair wind for me, warm and kindly. For seventeen days I sailed on across the ocean, and on the eighteenth their loomed before me the shadowy hills of this

land of yours . . . [and his raft destroyed in a storm]."

Homer, Odyssey 8. 452 ff :
"The palace of lovely-haired Kalypso (Calypso), though all the time that he [Odysseus] was with her he had had the comforts a god might have."

Homer, Odyssey 9. 29 ff :
"[Odysseus addresses King Alkinous (Alcinous):] ‘There was a time when divine Kalypso (Calypso) kept me within her arching caverns and would have had me to be her husband, and

another time subtle Aiaian Kirke (Circe) confined me in her palace and would have had me for husband also. Yet neither of them could win the heart within me.’"

Homer, Odyssey 12. 388 ff :
"[Odysseus tells King Alkinous that the sun-god complained to Zeus about the slaughter of his holy cattle by Odysseus' men:] ‘All this I heard from Kalypso (Calypso) of the

lovely hair, who herself had heard it, so she told me, from Hermes, messenger o the gods.’"

Homer, Odyssey 12. 448 ff :
"[Odysseus' ship was destroyed in the whirlpool of Kharybdis (Charybdis), and he escaped on some floating wreckage:] For nine days I [Odysseus] drifted; on the tenth night the

gods let me reach the island of Ogygia; there dwells Kalypso (Calypso), the goddess of braided hair and of strange powers and of human speech; she welcomed me and tended me."

Homer, Odyssey 17. 124 ff :
"[Telemakhos (Telemachus) tells Penelope of his conversation with Menelaus:] ‘The old god [Proteus] said he had seen Odysseus in much distress. This was upon a certain island

and in the house of the Nymphe Kalypso (Calypso); she is keeping him with her there perforce and thwarting return to his own country. He has no ships and oars and crew to take

him over the wide expanse of ocean. Such were the words of Menelaus.’"

Homer, Odyssey 23. 236 ff :
"[Odysseus tells Penelope of his travels:] ‘How he came to the island of Ogygia and to the Nymphe Kalypso (Calypso), who kept him there in her arching caves, desiring him to be

her husband, lavishing every care upon him and offering him deathlessness and agelessness--yet all this without winning his heart to it.’"