for Poemhunter
about drinking – and alone at that – without mentioning
that it’s Saint Patrick’s Day
when drinkers seldom drink alone
for the craic’s the thing
so next time you have to drink alone
except for your shadow,
notice that your shadow
under the light of the Moon,
dances more drunkenly, and sooner
– happy shadow –
than you. You haven’t noticed?
Then perhaps you’re thinker
than you drunk you are
pionta Guinness, le do thoil
during their life,
especially those who like wine.
But now, more than a thousand years
after your suicide,
men have named a crater on
the planet Mercury with your name…
Mercury, the planet the Greeks called
Hermes Apollo, messenger of gods and poets;
the shining one;
although men have not been there yet.
When they do, they may find you
sitting in your crater, watching the Moon
(we think it will appear to you
two times a day instead of once…)
and drinking wine with Uriah;
(and your shadows will be there too,
tall on the crater’s slope…)
you’re teaching him Chinese;
he’s translating your poems into English
with your approval.
He’d like that. We hope you would.
A strange place for immortals to drink wine;
but poets do and say strange things;
that’s why we love them, just as
children love surprises,
dear Li Po.