VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY: IN QUEST OF THE GOLDEN FLEECE A Poem by Charles Bryant I. Captain Early September: full moon beaming bright upon my bed warming the cooling night. Yes, the moon brings warmth. Did you not know? Three o’clock in the morning. Wakened by dreams of such a shining splendour, I cannot sleep. The moonlight silver Eros flutters down enmeshed by love he cannot comprehend brought to earth by all-embracing passion. I hear the golden rustle of time’s wings. Together we shall fly into the dark. Companions, living Myrmidons, my friends encompass me while still the time is ripe counsel me in ways of wisest love bring the benediction in a cup that we may toast each other and be glad. Eromenoi-erastai, we shall glide, a living mass of psyche, into the unknown that opens its arms in welcome, swallows us with fiery panting ardour: we are one. II. Chief Mate Your singing Myrmidons our rigging ranged, called to one another from the masts. At the tiller stood the still, veiled presence no one dared to watch or touch, the symbol flesh-imbued and made more real by concrete nearness. But where was the captain? all the mariners asked. Suddenly the cabin doors flew back at their own volition and every single wondering sailor saw the fierce seductive image that drew his soul, the true north of our magnet and our chart. And I – it was a needle pushed in my heart – watched your semblance, felt the searing pain, welcomed the covering darkness that soon came to shield me from your …