Made to Breathe

In regard to the gods,
their secrets, who knew human love
wanted darkness.

Signs were many. Years facing
the gods led to scorn. Nothing is.
Of this earth, nothing is told about myths
made to breathe merely

a hundred times. The stone,
at the very end, measured by time,
watches the world push.

*

Heavy yet upheld, the workman
works his fate, but is powerless to it.
I fancy melancholy in man, nights

without knowing the moment
tragedy begins—his little voice
necessary to night.

*

If there is a master over life,
he is eager to see the rock rolling.

*This is an erasure poem based on Albert Camus’ “The Myth of Sisyphus.”