Homage to Sextus Propertius -- Laura Cronk's version

#12
What yesterday was written with red fingers
            appears in whose noble Roman face, today?
The divided multitude is a multitude still,
            so many calling for Reason, the marked ones calling for Love.
My blushing thought has amplified your quiet blushing thought.
            Cynthia, the sound of your voice is 
freedom sounding: one word is love fifty times.
            Our like-hearted hearts are possessed by a true heart, 
a hot overtaking; can one world overtake the same? A student is 
            teaching Prometheus the separate parts of a single plant 
as it comes together: bursting with flower in a rush, a stream,
            reeling out its life in search of temporal love! 
It isn’t the first to pass long solitary nights 
            as a tender brooding bloom hanging heavy.
Hope tells of those few bright and streaming flowers
            who aren’t defeated in love.
It is this telling that gives me a multitude’s conviction,
            translating my untranslatable love into words.
I say my heart’s beginning and life and ending is this:
            Cynthia the first, Cynthia the last.

-- Laura Cronk