The Phoenix Never Knew

I.

She woke in her nest in the high palm tree.
"Is there something more beautiful than me?"
She asked the wind that had never seen snow.
But the wind said, "My lady, I cannot know."
"Is there something more beautiful than me?"
She asked the leaves of the stirring palm tree.
But they said, "Mistress, we have lived all our lives
Upon a palm tree with edges sharp as knives."
"Is there something more beautiful than me?"
She asked a wind that had come from the sea.
And the wind smiled and said, "Yes, my lady;
The sea when it is covered with clouds all shady."
"I cannot believe this," was the phoenix's decree,
"That there can be something lovelier than me!"
She leaped into the wind, and was borne then
Out of the domain she had known, past working men
Who stopped to gaze open-mouthed skyward.
The phoenix spread her wings, and their lord
Enchanted with the grace of her flame-feathers.
He mounted his horse and chased her wherever
She flew for days and days without end.
At last he collapsed, a corpse without a friend,
And died in the desert of the desert heat.
The phoenix never knew; on she flew, fleet
As a sandstorm in the country of her birth,
Irresistible as the sand rising up from the earth,
Luring like the wind that called her from her tree
And spoke with promises of the strange sea.

II.

The phoenix saw the sea, and began to fret,
For she had come upon the waters at sunset,
When the sky and the sea alike were of red
So brilliant, so beautiful, it strikes a man dead.
Yet the phoenix perched upon a palm tree,
And her only words were, "Lovelier than me?"
She watched as the scarlet died in a flare
That burned the heartsblood of empyrean air,
And following after it came purple and gold
Like conquering soliders charged by their lord to hold
The territory taken, whatever the cost.
Behind that came silver, like a gilding of frost,
Though of course the phoenix could never know
The touch of the cold, and had never seen snow.
Behind that was pink, and then the royal blue
That came dropping from the east, stately hue,
Robing and cradling his people, the shades,
As a king robes and guards his people with blades.
The phoenix watched as the sky deepened to dark,
As the dying sun sank with one final spark
Beneath the waters, to go beyond the foam,
And fight the dark all along his long journey home.
She watched, and watched, and saw the stars come
Out from their clouds, while the solemn-tapping drum
Of a planet, bright star, was a silent sentry. 
She sniffed, and preened, and sat upon her tree,
And a man who was passing home looked upon
Her gorgeous tail, with its feathers of saffron,
Her sapphire breast, and her jeweled eyes,
Her flame-red and gold feathers; his heart, wise
To all the notions then, all the wonders of splendor,
Burst as a way of giving its surrender.
The phoenix never knew; she flew on that night,
And never saw the sea by varied cloudy light.

III.

The phoenix flew over the sea, and saw an isle
Looming directly ahead; decided to rest a while.
She sank into a world of pure perfect green,
Alive with the rustlings of animals unseen,
Alive with the skippings of tossing waterfalls
That let out chattering, high-pitched laughing calls,
Enough like the birds to mingle with their song,
And set the birds scolding each other all wrong.
Here grew flowers of hues like the sunset:
Great dropping blooms of purple, gold, scarlet,
Orange and green as the pus from a wound.
The phoenix sat by a cascade, and her throat tuned;
Then she sent her song like a rainstorm ranging forth,
Lovely as the stars that in her flight to the north
She had seen hanging among the clouds like jewels.
Her song fell like raindrops on the pools,
And made hungry fish surface, silver mouths gaping.
Echoes of the melody those traps escaping,
They ranged along and made the stones glow
Through the glass of the rivers rushing below.
The trickle of water, the song of the rain,
They at once added to and seemed to explain.
Great palm leaves waved as a storm of sweet song
Descended over them, and made the trees long
For a higher, richer water they could not name.
The phoenix spread her feathers like flame,
And compared them, when the storm-song was done,
To the flowers of all hues aglow in the sun.
To her eyes, their beauty seemed a little affected;
She saw them glowing with splendor reflected,
And decided it meant the isle had none of true beauty,
Rather than admiring the mirror for its clarity.
At that moment, in the depths of the forest,
A tiny flower opened, nourished by her chorus.
Its hue was deep indigo, of purple and blue,
Richer by far than the others in scent and in hue.
The phoenix never knew; she flew on, away,
Bound to the north amid the waning of day.

Coda

I do not know if the phoenix found her bliss, 
Ever found that she alone had beauty's kiss.
I lost sight of her as she soared so far away;
I was more interested in the lord gone astray,
In the desert lions who cleaned up his bones,
And who might have raised him a pile of stones.

I do not know if the phoenix ever saw the sea,
At sunset or no, surpassing her in beauty.
I lost sight of her as she flew over the water;
I was more interested in the dead father's daughter,
Who wept when her father did not come home,
And at last from that pain wrote a beautiful poem.

I do not know if the phoenix upon her quest
Might have turned north or south, to east or west.
I lost sight of her as she flew to the north;
I was more interested in the flower come forth,
And how all over the island it sowed indigo seeds,
So that to this day that isle with beauty bleeds.

Farewell, phoenix! A lord died because of you;
You never slowed, and you never knew.
Farewell, phoenix! A man's heart you shattered;
You flew on as if none of it mattered.
Farewell, phoenix! You brought forth a flower,
But you never knew it was not alone your power.

Farewell, phoenix!
Farewell.