The Greeks knew best
the indifferent brutality
of justice. Their fragile cities
gleamed like lost unicorns
through the endless forests,
unpeopled and unlit.
They knew the sham behind the veneer
of agora and academy.

The dramatists wrote only of
what is:   justice and tragedy --
all one.

So close to the forest:
it moves on little feet.
So close to the forest:
we dare not disobey. Here,
in the City, you must know the Law,
and teach it.      So close
to the forest: the light cannot travel
beneath the hemlock
toward the night.