POEMS
FACES
When the XIX Legion was caught
in
the swamps of the Rhine
And bushwacked there by the natives,
Their armor dragging them into the mud,
And not a man among them lived to tell how they died
Or what they caught in the frame of their face
When the last stroke fell,
And when Germanicus found them at last,
They were' gone.
The mud had grown over the ripples they made.
Only their faces, nailed to the trees, remained.
When
J
ezebel, the haughty queen of an alien land,
Ran barefoot through all the men in her court,
Touching their hearts lightly
With the crescent of her toes, the palms of her hands
Easing their flesh as she ran,
They gave her to the dogs at last
In the heat of her running, the burst of her lungs,
And they pulled her down, and they ate her
Except for the soles of her lovely feet
And the white palms of her hands.
