And the world was Icarus
Which smelled of melting wax
…………. —Anonymous
Landscape With the Fall of Icarus
According to Brueghel
when Icarus fell
it was spring
a farmer was ploughing
his field
the whole pageantry
of the year was
awake tingling
near
the edge of the sea
concerned
with itself
sweating in the sun
that melted
the wings’ wax
unsignificantly
off the coast
there was
a splash quite unnoticed
this was
Icarus drowning
by William Carlos Williams
from Collected Poems: 1939-1962, Volume II
New Directions Publishing Corp., 1962
.