page 15

Some Held To Love By Hate

for Benjamin Constant

Pity drives some to madness, but not she
Whose madness, beyond pitiable, glares
Maddening from the crux of blind conceits
Taking time by the throat, demanding, sears

Love galled and helpless in her clutch.
But pity we who holds her, beyond calm
Or any expectation to be free
Since her erratic glance predicates harm;

Pinions to madness who would hold her sane.
I would not hold her, but may not relax
The bonds that hold my hands that held her hand
Believing, in brief innocence, love makes

Low high, and heaven nearer with a band
Sure as deliverance of the oppressed. It's clear
The oppressed suffer in innocence, and pity
Drives some to madness, while the fear

Of suffering loss of madness keeps some able
To suffer the lateral thorns of grief and thrive
Poised dangerously between the knives and murders
Such as her eyes prove, in whose fear I live.