Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). The New Poetry: An Anthology. 1917.

The King

By Skipwith Cannéll

SEVEN full-paunched eunuchs came to me,

Bearing before them upon a silver shield

The secrets of my enemy.

As they crossed my threshold to stand,

With stately and hypocritical gesture

In a row before me,

One stumbled.

The dull, incurious eyes of the others

Blazed into no laughter,

Only a haggard malice

At the discomfiture

Of their companion.

Why should such T h i n g s have power

Not spoken for in the rules of men?

I would not receive them.

With my head covered I motioned them

To go forth from my presence.

Where shall I find an enemy

Worthy of me as him they defaced?

As they left me,

Bearing with them

Lewd shield and scarlet crown,

One paused upon the threshold,

Insolent,

To sniff a flower.

Even him I permitted to go forth

Safely.

Therefore

I have renounced my kingdom;

In a little bronze boat I have set sail

Out

Upon the sea.

There is no land, and the sea

Is black like the cypresses waiting

At midnight in the place of tombs;

Is black like the pool of ink

In the palm of a soothsayer.

My boat

Fears the white-lipped waves

That snatch at her,

Hungrily,

Furtively,

As they steal past like cats

Into the night:

And beneath me, in their hidden places,

The great fishes talk of me

In a tongue I have forgotten.