THE CARYATID

No support for the thin wrists and silken
reach of her upper arms.
Shoulders of the most delicate of the caryatids
hold up a fragile, precarious universe.
She’s reading an indecipherably tiny script
of interlacing shadows from the evening façade
and feels how heavy burden of caryatids
turns into her wings.
Her niche between two blind arcades
seems to be cramped, and the square patch of shadow
on the ground — infinitely miniscule.
A tug — and the wind unplaits her of braids
and the body turns into an axis,
while ancient light beams through her features.

THE CARYATID