It took me all day, but I've found Rhina's sapphics: "Invocation," in the book Where Horizons Go.
Goddess, mother, mentor of those who live to
scribble verses, now in my seventh decade
reaping scanty laurels for minor triumphs,
Muse, I entreat you:
Do not slight me, Lady who never failed me
then, in youth when, stolen from mop and bucket,
merest seconds spent in your rites once brought me
sound of your timbrels.
Image, music, memory, mind's reflection:
let these now, as then, in the freight of each day
seem enough to treasure without betraying
moment to meaning.
Keep me truthful, grant that I never sing it
trendy, bending messages to their hearers,
louder, higher, stranger than speech would have it,
pitching for pennies.
Slap my hand hard, goddess, if once you catch me
reaching out for glory and those Big Prizes;
spare me, after reading the list of winners,
poisonous envy,
rage, excuses, rancorous grief and sniping.
Teach me you are singing in all those voices,
not in this or that one more than another's.
Teach me my one voice;
Teach me to work keeping it just my measure,
narrow, rooted, bound to the gift you lent me,
simple as dirt, useful as broom and ladle,
needle and trowel.
|