Sonnets to Minerva

I

What makes your art, what is its secret power?

Bethought by all mankind so sage and wise

You who above the great do yet so tower

Your essence I am left to but surmise.

Begot within the lofty crown of Jove

You made your way to show your arms to light,

And took with you the most of that you clove,

And now all gods do bow before your sight.

The key to your success I wish to find,

In risk of thus evoking dreadful wrath,

To share the golden fruit of noble mind –

To walk upon the scarcely trodden path.

I humbly kneel in fear and awe of thee,

And beg you leave my poor two legs to me.

II

To start my search, I think of what t’is not,

That fateful gift that I so wish to gain:

T’is not a laden ship with knowledge fraught –

Its hefty weight collected grain by grain;

Nor is it wit, so sharp upon the tongue,

That with a drip of poison seeks to sting,

And rends to bits a tender soul, so young,

Whose now too heavy heart forbids to sing.

Those burdens are too cumbersome to bear

And lead one from the chosen path astray;

As one walks those uncertain trails with care

The mark remains unconquered – far away.

Your talent is so airy, I suppose,

To burden not the petal of a rose.

III

The trait that I so dearly wish to hold

Can’t be that form of an egyptian art

That tries to convert alloy into gold

And fails to do so from the very start.

It calls from every nook all men to come –

That metal that has caused the great to fall –

And sheds the blood of those who share no sum,

But though it glits – it matters not at all.

A calf they cast of that for which they fought,

And fall upon their face in mud, and pray,

And voice in zeal a cry devoid of thought –

As though that yellow prophet were to stay.

Those riches pay thee naught of what is due,

And so receive no charm or touch from you.

IV

Some say your gift is not the lot of man,

And would perhaps bestow it on a fox,

Whose sly and quick and sharp and watchful clan

Predicts the shape of fate before it knocks;

Or on a hare, who tears across the land,

And matches, step for step, the strides of death;

They guess its pace is granted by your hand

So as to leave swift Thor in need of breath.

Or yet, in one more guess, they try to show

That yours is like the vision of an owl,

Whose eyes remain unclosed and wish to know,

And flash across the skies in hunt of fowl.

A search thus wrought is all but sure to fail –

Your wisdom can be found within a snail.

V

Some claim they know, and would that knowledge lease –

Indeed, they all but spread their thoughts by force;

They say the wise man lives his life in peace –

And thus his fearful soul is spared remorse;

They warn us sotto voce of the plight –

Those who would keep the gates of Janus shut;

With all their will they wish to flee the fight –

To turn their back (thus urge the sword to cut);

They preach for the green pasture of the herd –

Where there exists no strife or trial’s rigor;

They know not when our heart is fully spurred,

Nor when man’s plant grows with greatest vigor.

T’is not by chance that you, with wisdom crowned,

Have beaten mighty Mars into the ground.

VI

At times I thought that it was blessed art –

My Goddess, your most rich and glowing trait –

For which Horace left back his greater part,

And thus escaped the dreary jaws of fate.

But art, though lofty, grand, unchecked, and proud –

It whets and drives the cultures of mankind –

Delights the eyes, like Iris on a cloud,

But governs not the workings of the mind.

It so great a folly to believe

That muses with a Goddess can compete;

And should one claim that they they other reaved

Those nine would sigh, and then admit defeat.

An artist might relay a thought that’s true,

And yet mistake the nature of its hue.

VII

I stop to think of this that I have done –

These guesses are to you a great offense.

Your talent, by myself, cannot be won,

Nor by mankind divined with any sense.

To thus embark upon this hapless quest

Against the call of mind that me beseeched

That if I cared for beating in my chest

I should your godly shrine have never breached…

I wonder how the other gods do laugh,

And mock and sneer at my so vain attempt;

I fear you’d strike me with your vengeful staff,

And leave my broken body in contempt.

These thoughts I hope you find to be untrue,

But if I err I give my neck to you.

VIII

I stand before your searing marble eye;

Alone you loom above my head to judge.

I swear to you I meant to speak no lie;

Why does your godly bust refuse to budge?

And though these lines may be my final verse –

Your verdict’s that wisdom no man shall taste –

Before the river Styx I do traverse,

I’ll try to save this effort from a waste.

Your gift, my love, is but the one of choice –

A skeptic’s doubtful look upon the truth;

And in these final lines my ken I’ll voice –

Perhaps some future wanderer they’d sooth!

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