Tiresias witnesses another time
Ahead of the end of the days
In which Echo was a boy,
And in which Narcissus was a woman.
Who am I?
Who am I?
One cries out loud,
Whilst the other merely repeats and cries.
Tiresias weeps at the unfairness
Of his vision,
The conundrum of what befell
Them both, unsolved to sightless eyes.
Though unsighted, Tiresias is moved
By the plight of the Echo boy
And the Narcissus woman.
Echo, his name lost through
The dimness of time,
Barely speaks a word
Although his thoughts betray him;
Of his love for Narcissus
And his wish to be with her.
For Narcissus, Echo is just a sound,
A voice in her head that repeats
All she needs to hear,
All she already knows
And all that in time
Tiresias believes will come to naught.
Echo saw her beauty, the intelligence and told her so,
For Narcissus always showed interest in the thoughts
Of the Echo boy that gave her compliments in her mind
And who, if he was real, would have made such an attentive maid
For her to praise,
Knowing that the tribute would be repeated back to Narcissus.
Echo was an appealing boy, forever told, “You are so pretty”,
“You are so beautiful” but only told this to show his voice
Was capable of resaying the words back to those who paid him heed.
Narcissus locked Echo away. When he spoke she wanted to hear the voice
Of her own thought and did anything to keep her feelings intact.
For both Echo and Narcissus needed each other
To keep from starving to death of love.
“Who am I?” asked Narcissus.
“Who am I?” repeated Echo,
As they both grew frustrated in their appointed role,
The Echo finally does disappear into the wind
And gets carried along with the dust.
To Tiresias, he saw Juno
Had played a cruel trick upon them both
And whilst he coped with the understanding
Of there being
More untamed Earth than raging ocean,
To Narcissus and Echo
Who Am I?
Was more than a demand to the Heavens,
And even if Juno could answer
She would smile with disdain.
Narcissus looked in the mirror and saw her reflection
Juno more than usually cruel,
The hunter and the hunted, in each other’s
Place and Narcissus bit her lip,
Unashamed in love, and shrieked and yelled
Causing Echo to feel the pain and repeat again.
Who am I?
Who am I?
I ask you Jove to compel Juno
To answer me, to show the true
Likeness of Narcissus and to let Echo
Tell me how beautiful I am.
Who am I?
Who am I?
I have no voice of my own,
Yet my ideas are mine alone but
I repeat all that is implied
And inside I ask Jove to let me die.
Tiresias, far in the past,
Sees the mirror
Reflecting both souls
And begs of Jove to intercede.
To stop Juno’s malice
And give Narcissus and Echo peace.
“This far off time,
So cruel to beautiful Narcissus
And her slave Echo.”
Narcissus and Echo interlocked
One inside the other, inside the other,
Inside the other, the conundrum of their lives;
Which the Gods or design made them need each other
“Who are you indeed?” They ask of each other silently,
How dare you be so delightful?
Jove, majestic, all knowing
Concedes that his wife sees more
And begs the empress to release them from their prison
“But one will surely perish by doing so oh Jove,
Who would you see capitulate to the other?”
“Would Tiresias acknowledge the question once more?
Would the blind seer dare suggest that the Ocean recoils
At the thought of taking on land?”
“Who are they?”, Juno asks, “They are each other!
They are the feminine in the masculine
And boy in the girl, they are Human.”
Echo fades,
Pining away
At the thought
Of not telling Narcissus how beautiful she was
Over and over again.
Narcissus’ inner beauty
Then remains unseen
And she starts to weaken
And wilt, the need to be cherished
As a Human being now destroyed!
The question
That remained upon their lips
Forever haunting the past
Who Am I?
Who Am I?
Ian D. Hall 2014.