SLOUGH OF THE SEVEN TOADS
The elation of naming, that dispassionate
stance, of course it could not last. As all
first steps it was bound to lead to that first
misstep, that attenuated fall through ebony
branches into the Forest of Indifference. Oh
how to define the pain of it, the eclipse
of sky, the scales that seem to sprout
over one’s eyes, the petals of love-lies-bleeding
wilting in that thicket of night? Then a headlong
plunge into the slough of the seven toads
and there defiled by false iridescence, the barter,
the intrigue, the back and forth, that rough
exchange, the petty puffery of fame,
the flat inspection of their malachite eyes.
—Barbara Goldberg
____
Published in The Paris Review (from The Royal Baker’s Daughter,
forthcoming U. of Wisconsin Press, 2008)