The Black Christ & Other Poems/That Bright Chimeric Beast

by Countee Cullen

That Bright Chimeric Beast

(For Lynn Riggs)

THAT bright chimeric beastConceived yet never born,Save in the poet's breast,The white-flanked unicorn,Never may be shakenFrom his solitude;Never may be takenIn any earthly wood.

That bird forever feathered,Of its new self the sire,After aeons weathered,Reincarnate by fire,Falcon may not nor eagleSwerve from his eerie,Nor any crumb inveigleDown to an earthly tree.

That fish of the dread regimeInvented to becomeThe fable and the dreamOf the Lord's aquarium,Leviathan, the jointed Harpoon was never wroughtBy which the Lord's anointedWill suffer to be caught.

Bird of the deathless breast,Fish of the frantic fin,That bright chimeric beastFlashing the argent skin,—If beasts like these you'd harry,Plumb then the poet's dream;Make it your aviary,Make it your wood and stream.There only shall the swishBe heard, of the regal fish;There like a golden knifeDart the feet of the unicorn,And there, death brought to life,The dead bird be reborn.