Daphne Herself Poem by Nina Kossman

I will grow myself quiet leaves
in the difficult silence of chastity.

I will hide in the immense namelessness
though each tree murmurs to him my name.

I am the bed of leaves he can never scorch,
not even with his eyes of fire.

I am the naked face of the flower; a cross.
He cannot escape by reaching me.

The god and the goal; the lover and the loved;
the pursuit and the flight, entwined.

Though a god, he will die in the depths of my bark.
I will glisten his face on my leaves.

Every eagle will have his eyelids.
Every event—his speed.

Each one of the thousand suns
will pursue me as he has chased.

Each one of the symbols of silence
will learn his name I refuse to bear.

I am he: the sun, its immense bowl
pouring out selves as from a fount of chastity.

He is I: the ever-green song in flight,
the sun forever pursuing me.