Seeing and Not Seeing
The heroes never learn until too late,
Or maybe they do not find out at all.
Macbeth moves backwards. As he meets his fate,
He grasps his evil only. Truths appall
Him. Manliness and bravery he thinks
Will save his woman-stricken soul. The son
Of Hamlet, cuckold king, spiels out his stinks
Of words in rotten Denmark, as if pun
And learnèd books have teachings in them that
Will trounce his dithering. Anthony’s lust
Precludes his mind and make his strengths flop, flat.
Othello’s worst, betraying whitest trust.
King Oedipus alone accepts the facts
Heroically with wife’s brooch-eyeball acts.
~ Phillip Whidden