Published on: 12/18/2015
Platonic Ideals

When she arrived on campus, right away
the culture of the institution took
an unexpected turn— as though a ray
of light had flashed from some forgotten book

that formed the root of every discipline.
For once, the women and the men agreed:
her worth went deeper than her flawless skin
and satisfied a long-neglected need.

Her salient traits were the concinnity
that dignified her words, her ample bust,
her perfect legs, and the virginity
she modestly admitted to. The lust

to which most men would normally consign
themselves was sublimated into pure
aesthetic fondness for a graceful line,
and women journeyed to a farther shore

where jealousy and envy disappeared
beneath a cleansing wave of confidence.
The changes her engaging presence reared
bespoke a numinous intelligence:

She seemed to walk on clouds, and soon enough
the souls she touched were walking on them too,
until their daily lives became the stuff
of dreams. Encounters they once struggled through

were balmed by gracious cinctures of accord,
their conscience now the holy apse where strains
of newfound sacrament annulled the sword
of Damocles. The media took pains

to prearrange exclusive interviews,
and not a day went by her telephone
lay still. She was the center of the news,
and when reporters cornered her alone

and asked about her novel strategy
to stem the modern tide, It's tactical,
she'd say, a stroke to counter tragedy
by doing what is truly practical.