his offering for a footnote which did not require
this amiable discursion such as only he could love;
and as I sighed in inward kind despair,
and wondered when to break his scholar’s drift –
his body turned to crystal; sculptured silver-gold
in detail; his familiar profile then became
by heavenly realignment, ideal, heroic, sublime;
his steady gaze, like some divine geometry,
focussed on the paper which before
had been a spiderweb of tedious, fond thought,
was now an arrow shot at truth itself
in love, and lifetime’s care, and all humanity;
a god who had replaced a colleague’s frame.
It is enough just to recall that moment’s view;
no explanation; but the whole world made anew.