First Love, by Gregory Palmerino

The Fall of Phaeton, by Giovanni Antonio Bazzi (Il Sodoma) (Italy). Early 1500s.

First Love

​The morning breaks and the throaty cock crows
at her purple light, where the eastern gate
under the lingering morning star glows
with haste at my chariot and my fate;
when long-armed Polaris alone might steep
his starry cup into my blackened sea,
lift me far aloft, and promise to keep
what you, my love, have kept untrained on me.

But youth and I must take those burning reins,
as I am half to this failing earth bound,
into my feeble hands and dare to tame
the darkness and those fiery, wilding manes,
until I recklessly plunge headlong round
and set the dry world on fire just the same.

Gregory Palmerino

Gregory Palmerino's poetry and essays have been published in several online and print journals. His most recent work can be found at The Asses of Parnassus and New Verse News. He writes poetry in Connecticut's Quiet Corner, where he lives with his wife and three children, and teaches English at Manchester Community College.
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