Pandora

“Pandora” by Lawrence Alma-Tadema

 

reckless of impulse

you loosed on an innocent world

grave forces of darkness

I don’t damn

your naïve

self-indulgence

but defiance of duty

is unforgivable

you were Eve

you were trusted

by Hesiod and all of humanity

with that ugly unopened jar

some mistook for a box

there’s just not enough

redemption

in your having attached feeble hope

to that terrible train

of bleak depredations

no matter what Zeus ever

said in his fatherly heart

your pardon will die and rot

in my silent anger