Epitaph engraved on tombstones
Are heartfelt accolades to a past soul
Poured emotions in golden words
Are written with the ink of love
But what of those whom none adored
Whose insipid lives remained barren, devoid
Of the sweet ambrosia of affection
Narcissus had led one such life
A selfish ,self-engrossed existence
He shunned all those enamoured
By his ethereal, sculpted beauty
Never acknowledging the beauty of love
And the boon he’d been endowed
Bringing about the ruin of the nymph Echo
And the death of Amenias in the throes of love
On his threshold , bewailing his heartlessness
The Nemesis the dealt him the punishment
For his callous and vain stance
He fell a victim to his own beauty
Enchanted by his own reflection in a pond
And died of the venom of unrequited love
And there bloomed the sad flower
Filled with grief in its flimsy transparent veins
As it gazes with lovelorn eyes
At its own reflection in the Styx with longing
It was the flower whose soporific breathe
And hueful blooming presence
Lured the innocent Persephone
Away to aid Hades in her abduction
As the pure drop of elixir
Changed into intoxicating wine
In the blazing hearth of the earth
Such is the saga of the daffodil
Invisibly etched on papyrus of history…