Poem: Changes 33/Retreat Is Not Surrender—

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I've been writing these Changes poems since March, 2006—very loosely based on the I-Ching. Today I have worked through half of the i ching hexagrams. No. 33 is the turning point. I crib from three versionsof the book—James Legee's I Ching: Book of Changes; Wilhelm, and Baynes' The I Ching or Book of Changes, with a suitably strange forward by Carl Jung (my favorite version, and it's a beautiful book with a great dust jacket); and a version I keep at the office, Rediscovering The I Ching.

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Poem: Changes 33/
Retreat Is Not Surrender—


We are at not at liberty to retreat
When the way ahead is fogged
When doubt and darkness set in

When reason degenerates
And bedevils the heart
Flight is not retreat

Flight is a mad scramble
For the exits
Flight is throwing in the towel

Retreat is tactical
A gathering of reason
As the dark forces assemble

A provisional retreat
Is choosing the right moment
While you are still under

A full head of steam
And biding your time
For the counter-attack.
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