The portrait shows this – his eyes fixed elsewhere,
Mehmet the Conqueror holds a rose
To the Turkic scimitar of his nose.
The engrossing necessities of money and war,
The wise politician’s precautionary
Fratricides, the apt play of power –
All proper activities in his sphere,
And he excelled at them all. So why the flower?
A nod, perhaps, to something less worldly;
Not beauty, I think, whatever that is,
Not love, not ‘nature’,
Not Allah, by that or any other name –
Just a moment’s immersion in the texture
Of existence, the eternal passing of time.
