Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem 

Narcissus was the lucky one, escaped

The dirtiness of others in him, round

Him with their sweat.  Their mouths gawped and he raped

Them never touching.  Facing love he drowned

Them in his mirror turning that white face

To purity deflecting dirty parts.

He leapt through beauty using hyperspace

To save his soul from bad-breathed panting hearts

Besmirched with lust.  Instead he leaned to truth

That everyone has always wanted seen,

By Platos maybe, only.   In one youth

Unthinking he rejected the obscene.

  He viewed his beauty on his local Lethe

    And changed to petals hovering next to death.

~ Phillip Whidden