sculpture: michelangelo photoart: sharon auberle
David Hominidae
after
Michelangelo
by Marjorie Stamm Rosenfeld
For
stone that breaks the giant hold, for strength
I
love you not, but love the languid length
Where
right the slack and narrow arm now takes
A
certain fortitude that weakness makes.
Then,
after turbulence, I love your grace
At
end, when grace is grace in rest. Of
rock
Your
softness; yet no hardihood let mock
Your
maleness, closed and petalled in its place.
I
love for life, for so short days, for bud
Laid
out on block, for chiselled pallor, blood--
More
than the upward rising of the lines,
The
deep dependence downward that defines
A
homily to God by mortal strain,
The
manly droop of marble
And
its vein.
~ first published in Southwest
Review
