Tuesday Poem: The Old Horse

The Old Horse

Unfortunately this old horse doesn't know when it's beaten.

Taking to the arena like an old man
with a broken adamantine sword
and the truth of
a misspent
youth

Fortunately this horse keeps running all the way to the knackers

It's easier this way, saves the trouble of rounding up
all Medusa's zealously ignorant friends
their smiles long since
turned to
stone 

Unfortunately this old horse stumbles, broken winded, an object of ridicule


There is a truth like a rock in its shoe
the final gun a pebble
lost in many
layers of
stone
 

A.J.



Another cheery poem. But never mind, some really exciting news next week - at least for me, so until then, have a great week and why not check out all the other fab poems up on the Tuesday Blog



P.S. To find out more about this poem check out DYADIC DISEQUILIBRIUM AND THE ALTERNATION OF DEBT: EPISTLES 1.1 or maybe suggest to me some other, better posts about Horace, or at least the work attributed to him, if you know one...in the meantime, this cobbled together extract isn't quite the same as flogging a dead horse...but it is written in a dead language ;)


Prima dicte mihi, summa dicende Camena,
spectatum satis et donatum iam rude quaeris,
Maecenas, iterum antique me includere ludo...


...‘solve senescentem mature sanus equum, ne

peccet ad extremum ridendus et ilia ducat.’...