Two oil paintings of Susanah
(APOCRYPHAL) SUSANAH
Daniel knew how to make
The evildoers pay,
Knew how to shake
The truth from what they say.
Susanah young and sweet
Like many a temptress
Walks on innocent feet
Into an evil fortress.
The two old satyrs
Have her in their reach
But their grasp splatters
Against her honest breach
Of what she did not know.
Repulsed, reviled, they vow
She free shall not go.
They conspire only now
They’ll go to council high,
Accuse of what they could not have
Say the flash of thigh
Drew their attention to a knave
With whom she lay
And saw her open to the beast
And let him have his way
To taste her carnal feast.
So the council drew her nigh
Laid the charges at her feet.
Aghast, she could just deny,
Say she was yet discreet.
The judges to their peers assent:
The accusers, respected men,
Not known to lie with sin;
The girl, voluptuous, then
To the eye if naught more
Could easily, they thought
Have tempted any poor
Youth who might have caught
Himself within her net
Of shapely nubile flesh
And her eyes and lips wet
With lust and all so fresh.
Then Daniel stepped forth,
Said he could solve the mess.
Take the accusers henceforth
To separate rooms to confess
How thus all came to be.
He groped for details not
Yet conspired. Let them see
A different scene hot
Beneath a tree. What’s this?
One says fruit; one says fir.
Let us these charges dismiss:
The old goats are one liar
Inside two cloaks. Here stands
An innocent blessed of the Lord.
The men were the evil hands
Caught by their own word.
[Not so fast. I think more
May appear if we look.
The girl was no whore
We can write in the book,
But even at her tender age
She had wiles enough
To know that in a stage
She could play a rough
And tumble kind of girl
To draw old men there
And make them a world
Un-thought of where
They trod so many years.
Maybe she wanted a small
Thing or money or appear
To be their desire’s thrall.
No matter. She played,
They hungered and grasped,
She drew back and prayed,
They angered and lashed.]
2006
"(Apochryphal) Susanah" was included in the unpublished An Operose Hierodule of the Muse, 2008. This topic of the young girl seduced (or is it the old men seduced?) is controversial. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov most famously studies this theme, and he does it in such a way, so the reader is unsure of who is in charge, the older man or the girl. The recent movie An Education also delves into this theme. Flash! Just this morning I was listening to Miami's classical music station as I wrote, right after 6 a.m.Garrison Keillor comes on with a few moments of poetry and discusses events in literature that happened on this date. It turns out that Lolita was published on this date in 1955; Graham Greene, the British writer, gave it a good review, but others condemned it as pornography. In light of new research indicating that American girls are reaching puberty at an earlier age, this theme may be revisited. NOTE: I generally have a cup of coffee (it is in my hand now) with breakfast before I write. Keillor also told that Honoré de Blazac, the 19th century French fiction writer, died on this date; reportedly, Balzac drank 40-50 cups of black coffee every day. His heart gave out at 51. Below are items related to this blog.
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