Glimpsed in the Tower

A visitor from across the sea, on finding me in my cloistered office


Atop her tower, a casement medieval 
(in fact, it is a later imitation)
shadows the Fencing Bear, and all that’s evil
she quells, at least in the imagination
of those across her too-divided nation
who grasp at slogans, dragons, and her ditty
composed so men might imitate creation.
Readers, she dwelleth in no earthly city. 

The ‘ivory tower’ is all too oft a motto
condemning those who choose to stand aside
who shun the ‘real world’ and stagger, blotto,
on that thin drink receptions now provide.
Chicago has its towers, South Bend its grotto.
(Readers, reveal which campus others betters.)
But, as Sylvester taught the infant Otto
our camp is our republic, that of letters.

Ivory and horn the gates, in Vergil’s tale
through which our souls return to earthly joys.
The ivory gate is false, those towers must fail.
For ivory dreams deceive. So she deploys
dragons which we must fight. Amid the noise
of gunfire (take that 2nd Amendment down)
the calm she listens for, that still small voice,
the prayerful, joyful, Rachel Fulton Brown.

—David Ganz

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