Yellow Charon

Tell me, O muse, of the man of many devices
who ended his wandering of the boundless wild world
And settled in the silent safety of the suburbs.

The hermitic Hermes solus paterfamilias
Who morning rises to drag his daughter to the bus
Packing bags like a mule with caduceus bassoon
He conveys his fare to the cul-de-sac riverbank.

Yellow Charon docks extending his grim Betsy Gate
Forcing firm distance between parent and fare-taker.
Arcane Hermes places the obolus offering
Preparing his charge for shouting shores of foreign lands
And watches the ferryman retract the red stop plaque.

No paper streamers tossed and torn by growing distance
Another’s mother on the bank of this Acheron
Banally states her bon-voyage as “another day.”

The reply from the psychopomp pater is not as swift
As he waves the white handkerchief in his measured shrift
Understanding it is for the tears brought by the rift.