His previous exertions had left him numb and vacant. Thoughts now glided over him like the delicate wash of waves moving slow over flat stones. The call of the gulls, the smell of the wine-dark sea, the haunting melody of the priestess of doom, all these lying latent just beneath his immediate consciousness.

From sight and sound he bound the crew. Their ears he caulked with tar from trees, their eyes he masked from brazen glare with strips of cloth.

They steer the galley at his barked command; she ploughs the narrow channel between the rocks. The trio of Sea-Nymphs heave in to view, their voices ringing out songs of such sweetness that the very birds are put to shame. Sad and seductive are the lilting tunes that teasingly claw at his ears.

A spume of foaming sea-drops soak him in briny film. With enticing shapes and swaying forms, with fatal, sweet pleadings, a mist of froth-tipped melody inflames latent passion, overtakes his caution; to tireless wailing he soon succumbs and falls under Siren spell.

With breath crushed out of his lungs, his eyes spin, tongue lolls and perception dims to the merest hint of a dream. Where is he?

Did he at one time exist? In what form does he exist now? 'Is this consciousness' he thinks - for here he is, unbidden yet aware of a human form collapsed on the beach, semi-naked in the surf. Copied from the future to a past that never existed except in his mind.

Daughter of Titan, the goddess Hera, or was it Persephone of the seven seas or some other female deity? She has infected him with a vision of poisoned paradise through this time of guilt, panic and transcendence.

The man was no longer man; substance no longer solid, presence no longer defined. Only in essence did he exist at all, as one un-thought polyp in the plankton of space, as a random number in the eternal equation, as an unmade symbol in the algebra of chaos. And the Sirens sang on.

Siren’s Song

Thy zest is abated
Thy course is run
Say farewell then
To this earthly sum
Your Priestess dies
At the hand of fate
Friends desert you
At judgement date
Your manhood briefly
Shone in youth
Now gone forever
Sweet smell of pursuit
Your hacking cough
And misted eyes
Bring you nearer 
To your demise
You cannot turn back the spell
Your time is brief
Spend it well


Sirenenlied.

Dein Eifer, er schwindet

Dein Weg zu Ende gegangen
sag dann Adieu 
dies irdische Bangen

Deine Priesterin stirbt
durch Schicksals Hand

Am Abrechnungstag
zerbrochene Freundesband

Deine Manneskraft kurz 
in Jugend aufgeblüht
für immer dahin

Jagdfieber so süß

Der Husten hart
die getrübten Augen
führen Dich näher

Deinem Tod entgegen

Umkehren lässt sich nicht

Der Zauber Bann

Deine Zeit ist knapp

Nutze sie dann.