The Myth of Gifts

IN A green-shadowed meadow
Once, before Time was hours,
The creatures, in rehearsal
To show their new-given powers,
Came trooping, one by one,
Past Titan’s younger son,
Ready for the dispersal;

And Epimetheus, dealing
His gifts with reckless hand,
Smiled at the leopard bland,
Her curved claws half-revealing,
At shambling bears, with jaws
Sagging, and awkward paws
Their violence concealing.

Grasshoppers’ grave-faced children
Tried on their shining armor,
Stretching their legs to test
Each tender joint with care;
Against the cooler air
Into her woolly vest
The old sheep settled, warmer;

The monkey pondered shrewdly
His tail; and shy, but proud,
Long-necked giraffes moved gently
Out of the swelling crowd
Where the woods’ shadows thin
Flickered their dappled skin;
The braying ass stamped rudely;

And owls with ruffled feathers,
And hawks, on lean curved wing,
Flew past — all creatures dowered
With beak or claw or sting,
For strength or guile assessed,
Into the forest pressed
Where man, forgotten, cowered.

Pale, giftless, trembling — there
Prometheus, late returning,
Found him, and grieved, discerning
His plight — of weapons bare,
Those frail arms, those weak hands,
The helpless form that stands
Upright, to heaven turning.

He grieved the more, remembering
That clay beneath his touch —
Creation’s thrill, persuaded
Of power overmuch,
His own rash impulse, bent
Toward experiment —

Man, now by gift unaided . . .

Then sought he heaven, stealing
Fire from the gods’ great star,
Yet, knowing what gods are,
Feared still for the heaven-gazing
Earth-creature, whose desires
Would burn more fierce than fires,
Remediless. With slow
Gift of the torch, bright-blazing,
His Maker watched him go.