Phi Beta Kappa poem
                                Yale, 2000

We could almost see her
said to have risen in the bay
from sea foam and the blood of Ouranos' sliced genitals
tossed out of heaven.

We could almost see
how she must have sat on the long arm of rock
that half-cradled the bay
and how she combed seaweed out of her hair with a
   scallop shell

before rising in a commotion of salt light and doves' wings
to terrorize the earth.
Squinting, we could almost believe
as we could almost see

inland, at Paphos, her temple erect
on the ruined marble floor paving
amid column chunks and cringing olive trees
as the horizon trembled in haze

and distant mountains tried in their softness to resemble the
   female body.