Narcissus Poeticus

A proposed collection of poems. Ideally to be accompanied by various images mostly by well known artists, such as paintings and drawings by Dali, Poussin, Caravaggio, ancient Archaic Greek paintings, and others; as well as photos of various type of narcissi.
.

Workpoints  for the project:

  • Narcissus - the boy who lost himself by finding himself?
  • "Know thyself" - on the doors of the temple at Delphi.
  • Narcissism - Freud's Primary ad Secondary
  • Dali's Transformation of Narcissus.
  • Daffodils as examples of narcissi ( and narcissism — Wordsworth?)
  • Narcissi as a root (no pun intender) derivation of narcotics - it is suggested that a numbing drug was obtained from the bulb, which was/is certainly harmful to animals. 
    Or maybe the "numbing" was from the scent: " It was a thing of awe whether for deathless gods or mortal men to see: from its root grew a hundred blooms and it smelled most sweetly, so that all wide heaven above and the whole earth and the sea's salt swell laughed for joy." (Homeric Hymn to Demeter.)
  • The plant that Persephone was picking when she was abducted by Hades.

One of my poems (to be published in Between New Year And Old)  for The Narcissus Poeticus:


    Why He Stares Into The Pool

    Because my father was a river
    there is water in my veins

    Because my mother was a marsh lily
    I find my love in shadow-shimmer
    below green willow, below black alder

    Because water is a fierce and faceless god
    of that realm between the solid and the bodiless

    Because I have hunted every game
    in every forest, hill and field

    there is no sport left but quarry of the self
    and I am deaf to any other voice
    and blind to any other face

    Because my mother’s fingers
    were playing in the riffles

    Because my father was a torrent 
    that let nothing pass

    Because my father was a river
    my heart is fish-roe cold

    Because my mother was a stream-blossom
    my heart is a mouse
    crouching beneath a fallen leaf.