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This poem is taken from PN Review 103, Volume 21 Number 5, May - June 1995.

M: a poem in ten chapters and one thousand lines John Peck


Avec reconnaissance apres une maladie, et pour Jehanne

Nature has kept everything in view,
     the end no less than the beginning or
     the intermediate period of duration;
     much as a boy who throws a ball in the
     air.
- Marcus Aurelius,
Meditations, VII. 20

I May have towerd above the battle, the mind of that girl
II It will be nothing that is not classic, delicate
III Steadily without thrusting, wind penetrated what joy
IV The oily bronze of afresh monument to the fallen
V Heel slithers, hunting, and the hand widens
VI Registered are Augustine's offerings to the scriptures
VII Hoplite Sokrates proposed the choices of nonviolence
VIII Just as an advertising floater trails its tow plane
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