Recently I wrote a short creative piece called “Echobox” that is part poetry, part realistic fiction and part fantasy, which explored through eyes of a young boy people’s interactions with video media, specifically television. It reminded me of a poem I wrote nigh on ten years ago, called “Narcissus.” The poem was intended to be read while listening to a selection of music played on a solo instrument. It was part of a cycle of similar pieces I performed called, “Solipsist.” This particular part of the cycle was intended for string bass, an instrument I played in my younger days but have since given up. The studio recording for this poem/music piece was, alas, lost when the laptop I used for recording suddenly ceased to operate. As such, the Solipsist album remains incomplete, with the only live performance having been recorded by a third party at extremely low fidelity and volume. In the near future (once I replace some failed studio equipment) I may reconstruct and re-record the music. For now, here is the poem.

Narcissus

Echo

That weeping echo

Lost by the water’s edge

A pale thing never heard

Except in echo

Poor weeping echo

Left forgotten,

Never known.

To peer into the cool pond

To forget man, woman,

And god (Poor echo!)

At the beckoning of Nemesis

I crept over the mossy bank

And saw peering back at me

Like a vision of poor echo’s lament

Not the beauty she sought,

But a monster!

Vicious, ugly, tormenting.

Eyes turned inward

Scowling, raging, forgetting.

Nemesis of my Nemesis.

Poor echo!

How did she come to love

One such as this, or

Did she love another,

Who came before this horrid creature?

I reach out to kill it

To end its misery and the misery it inspires

And shall make it a monument

In remembrance of horror.

As we remember

Poor weeping echo

Left forgotten,

Never known.