ok-i want some editoral help here
frost
been up since three, and now its nine
in Terry's car, moving onto a secondary highway
barbwire fences/blank white fields
lynn the writer,
and jeff who speaks russian
behind me
and we talk
our conversation rolling
with a furious energy
until i see
a murder of crows,
resting in the fields
i start with a few lines of Frost,
and forgetting the 2nd stanza
jeff starts in
we finish it together
latter,
he writes
nothing gold will stay
and slides it to me
with subterfuge
a warning, a hint ?
a sputter of nervousness-
he knows other ones:
talking to him, we recite lines
of "stopping by a woods on a snowy evening"
and "two roads diverged"
and after dinner, i walk to the dorms
and look up
the birch and pine, a net to hold the stars
and black sky/white snow
the bite of cold
alone for half a minute
i remember years ago i underlined the last words of snowy woods
and wrote carefully beside them-
death
the miles and miles to go before you sleep
is not death,
it is awe,
and there is no need to be caught in the cold
when there is someone who knows the allusions
― anthony easton (anthony), Monday, 27 January 2003 06:39 (twenty-three years ago)
why do I stand here freezing/when he knows the allusions inside?
last line rewrite, courtsey of Aubade .
― anthony easton (anthony), Monday, 27 January 2003 07:03 (twenty-three years ago)
I like it. I'll try to be picky, as if my opinion on poetry is worth anything at all. Shouldn't
latter,
he writes
be later, he writes?
he knows other ones: isn't good. 'Others' or 'other verses' or 'other poems', but 'other ones' is anticlimactic, weak and clumsy. I'm not sure about mentioning 'Two Roads Diverged' either, in that it is a widely loathed cliche nowadays, so may not contribute to the mood and meaning (and I love Frost).
Worst of all is your friends' names reminding me of the Electric Light Orchestra, but they may be their real names that you want to keep.
― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Monday, 27 January 2003 13:31 (twenty-three years ago)