Jill

The Picture

You were kind to me. The things

You said about my poems.

I felt the youth behind your words -

An independent wisdom.

Today you sent a picture,

And tonight I fell in love.

You're a child, and I'm a child,

But nonetheless I'm older.

Across a continent we write -

And whence the sweet illusion -

The fact you are a woman,

The impression you're a girl?

Since I saw your photo, I've

Begun to like my poems.

It makes no sense, but let it be.

Life is all confusion.

7-25-13

Jill, A New Poem

Willful, stubborn and defiant,

Beautiful, a spitfire -

We have written many months -

Today she sent a picture -

Not a recent one, but one

When she was just a girl -

How long ago? 42

Years. She was a beauty -

As she is at 60.

An enigma – that I felt

An understanding youth in every

Syllable she wrote.

Now the photo – which I framed -

Cements and underscores

The certainty of her and my impression.

She went to Europe, told the Pope

That Jesus is a fiction.

She was there with Shakespeare when he

Wrote her favorite play -

Macbeth. But she likes Ginsberg.

These are words. What good are words

To picture an impression?

7-25-13

 

Two Hours

I sat in Denny's, read my book

And thought the poems brilliant.

I paid the check and left and now

The damned illusion's gone.

My mind is like a Ferris Wheel,

Either up or down.

7-25-13

 

GOP

The enemy of life and hope,

Tomorrow and the people,

Old or poor, but not the rich,

Is Republican.

7-25-13

 

Good Verse

When Larkin wrote “This Be The Verse”,

How confident the title.

Am I as right in my impression

That my poems are good?

50 years I've been insane.

For 50 years I've written.

I have written all I must,

But I continue writing.

To cast aside my ancient peeves

And childhood misbegotten,

And for the sake of poesy,

Just write, forgetting Keats.

Am I a genius? That's a word

Capote called himself.

And men were calling Shakespeare years

Before he ceased to be.

It's a word, unfeeling word,

And like a stone through tissue,

It drops into the water, sinks

And barely leaves a ripple.

I loved the word when I was young.

It's nothing to me now.

7-25-13

 

A Prejudice

Is this another prejudice?

That people with tattoos

Despite how happily they smile,

Are adders neath the skin?

Something made them tattoo up.

It wasn't independence,

As everyone is doing it,

Except the simple few.

7-25-13