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after the winter comes the spring
Folder:
seasons somewhere here there different same
sleepless quaint yet never vain
amid my heart your youth my flame
flickers upon a wick your name
in the quiet my eyes have seen
through pitch and black within a dream
enduring promise prepared serene
what's more or less a fleeting thing
today as yesterday bound to leave
a tired glimpse a brief reprieve
to part the webbing spider's weave
upon uncertain faith believe
now if i were to hold a hand
build on love and truth and stand
between the current beneath the sand
i'd gladly strive against a band
of raiders charging all around
trembling seas and wind and ground
thundering vehemently emitting sound
if it were a hand be found
through trials torrents drought and rain
through tears and sorrows doubt and pain
through every fear through every strain
o'er every mountain through every plain
for in the morning birds will sing
of nights near ending begins the dream
what's more or less an eternal thing
after the winter comes the spring...
It’s so true..
It's so true
After the winter comes the spring
But here's the thing
Summer saying after the spring
Comes the fall!
Whoever's saying that is very dumb
Everyone knows it's not the fall
That comes after spring
Of course, it's autumn!
Wait..
Have I gone mad and lost my reason?
I don't know what season follows what season!
Summer saying I should shut up
I know it! I just forgot ok?
A senior moment!
This is embarassing!
Let me get back to you...
By the way, I liked your poem!
In the Autumn of 1976, during
In the Autumn of 1976, during my first collegiate term, I heard what was then a new song, just released, Frampton's "Baby, I Love Your Way." At that time, it was given AM radio play in a truncated version; and so was the 45 RPM that my parents purchased for me and brought up to my dorm room. During the holiday break, I asked my parents for the album for Christmas, and, on Christmas Day, I heard the song with the exquisitely poetic second stanza intact---and, hearing it for the first time, in the privacy of my bedroom with my headphones on and my parents' incessant chatter momentarily shut out, I was so amazed by the that stanza that I simply sat staring at the wall, mouth hanging open, more amazed at this song than ever I had been by any other music of that kind. Since then, forty-six years, that song has been my favorite secular music. (Not even the first movement of Dvorak's Ninth Symphony, "From The New World," comes near to it.)
I said all that to say this, and to give you enough background so that you know the authenticity of this statement: Your poem, more than any other I can remember reading, reminds me of Frampton's "Baby, I Love . . ." And reading this, I again had that feeling of amazement. Is it the language? The strong imagery? The contours of the lines? Frankly, I don't need to know, because looking "under the hood" of the poem, so to speak, would trivialize its impact on me. I think it was Vladimir Nabakov, himself an astute lepidopterist, who spoke of the tragedy of catching and then gassing a butterfly so that one can dissect its parts and view them under a microscope. That will afford a good view of the anatomy, but the butterfly will never fly again, or visit a flower, or sip nectar. I will not subject myself to losing the effect of your poem in order to understand how that effect is achieved.
In the twenty-one years of my membership at PostPoems, I have been tremendously blessed and privileged to read some poems that are incredible masterpieces of poetic language. This poem, I gladly say here and now, is one of those.
Starward
I've been revisiting my old
I've been revisiting my old poetry myself, astonished to find I don't hate it. You see, I generally loathe what I write. As though it weren't good enough. Until recently, that is, somehow I've learned to enjoy even the process. Most of these poems, written between nine and seven years ago were written for one person, a woman who used to post on here frequently. It was love, or perhaps limerence, for her that drove me to write poetry in the first place. I was still just finding my voice back then, so I apologize if some of the poetry is a tad-singsongy. I didn't know then that poetry didn't have to rhyme. Hope you enjoy going through my old work!
"Paper is patient." - Anne Frank
I am enjoying your work very
I am enjoying your work very much. I don't pay much attention to what is new and what is old---an omission I learned as part of a reading strategy at college---it is just, all of it, your work. At one time, I made false divisions (early and late) in the work of two of my favorite Poets, Vergil and Wallace Stevens. These were, as I learned, false constructions. So that I learned that the Vergil who wrote of the amorous (and sometimes naughty) shepherds in the Eclogues was really no different from himself when later building The Aeneid. (The only writer I have ever encountered for whom Early and Late, or Old and New, seems to work is Stephen King, and I am very prejudiced toward his early stuff, and not at all toward his later stuff.)
As for rhyme, I too thought it had to rhyme until I began reading it. When I was a freshman, we were all required---or our parents were required---to go to a commercial bookstore and pay for a paperback anthology of American poets from the late 1600's to the late 1950's. I was shock at how swiftly rhyme dropped away. Then I read Milton's epic Paradise Lost (his revised edition with the one page essay explaining why Milton hated rhyme and, by is old age, refused to write it).
Starward
It seems fitting to come back
It seems fitting to come back here and start experiencing the spectrum of words as they issue from mind and heart.
And as we go through the latter part of winter and the hankering for spring rising, this being a corresponding work of verse.
To be uplifted, inspired and encouraged is such a blessing.
here is poetry that doesn't always conform
galateus, arkayye, arqios,arquious, crypticbard, excalibard, wordweaver
I always appreciate your
I always appreciate your feedback. Revisiting the past, even its winter seasons, can shed new light on the present. I hope you've enjoyed what you've read so far!
"Paper is patient." - Anne Frank