Orpheus

Painting by Joseph Paelinck 1818


Orpheus


I.

Orpheus can never look back at the real woman
trailing behind him out of hell, the woman that
anybody could see with ordinary eyes. Orpheus must
keep his eyes firmly fixed on the imaginal Eurydice
before him, towards whom he has struggled all his
life. She is not imaginary, not at all, but realer
than any mere apparency, than any momentary act of
seeing. He must move always towards that perfect
image of his wife, and so sustain himself and his song.
If ever he turns back, that is, regresses into seeing
his wife as an ordinary woman, she is lost.
And he is lost.

II.

Orpheus can never look back
at the real woman trailing behind him
out of hell, the woman that anybody
could see with ordinary eyes.
Orpheus must keep his eyes firmly fixed
on the imaginal Eurydice before him,
towards whom he has struggled all his life.
She is not imaginary, not at all,
but realer than any mere apparency,
than any momentary act of seeing.
He must move always towards that perfect image
of his wife, and so sustain himself
and his song. If ever he turns back, that is,
regresses into seeing his wife
as an ordinary woman, she is lost.
And he is lost.


Robert Kelly

Posted over on Poets.Org

1. Kelly's prose poem.
2. Line Breaks by Glenn Buttkus