The goddess sits in the axhandle park:
she would give more grain, but corn won't grow
The trees can lift their arms skyward,
but their hands and hair sprout flames.
when the old shade goes loafing (though evening
can't come any closer). Could he manage disembodiment
before now, the fire of the flower would still
But you, knowing the richer reds
and deeper blues appear briefly at dusk
then withdraw into their own flame...
He goes out at evening, shirt long, baggy as a coat,
his white beard flows from the sack-like face,
the outstretched hat-brim;
he has made himself bewildered: Where are the poets
chanting to the multitude? The headlong, vulgar, robust
freedoms of the crowd? Is there only you?
Bleating out this quick-flaring image? You chant
the gawk-shuffle, art-patter, and wonder how the plant
ever let you in. The inferno of the city blazes
around us, we detail its hidden lights.
1 comment:
Interesting interaction imagined here by the poet, himself and Whitman as two of a kind. I sense fondness towards Whitman and yet embarrassment, inadequacy; I too would feel embarrassed (as a poet) in the presence of a great poet like Whitman.
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