Rupert Wanted Surrender
“Love is a breach in the walls, a broken gate.
Love sells the proud heart’s citadel to fate.”~ Rupert Brooke
Would women be as likely as a man
To write such sentiments, to think of love
As breaching walled in strength, as Æthelstan
Attacking York? Would Ecgwynn think that shove
And cracks were what a woman’s love should be
About, or would she judge that love is more
A matter of a mother’s chestnut tree
That brings forth candles and its nuts galore
In season? Would a woman think a gate
Should be a battered door in love’s attack?
Indeed, would women feel that love is fate
Like battering rams deployed by maniac
Testosterone? The fortress men protect
Is pride. That swell is what must not be wrecked.
~ Phillip Whidden