Interlude IX

I keep trying to write a poem about acorns. I also wanted to write a poem about fog. This isn't really quite either of them, but at least it made me feel better on the fog front. The only attempt I have regarding acorns is mostly cliché. The other attempt was on some receipt paper from work and I can't find it now. Probably I threw it away because I thought it was bad? But now I can't remember any of it, so who knows. On the other hand, I have have made lots of edits to poems from the last year and a half or so and am feeling much better about them. A number of them are, I think, as close to perfect as one can ever hope for. So there's that. (They're out of season now, though, so you'll have to wait 'til spring/summer to see them.)

This poem was inspired, obviously, by the quote there from Lord Dunsany as I was reading The King of Elfland's Daughter. It's undergone some revisions and I think it's coming along pretty well, though it still is a ways from being done; I'm not sure it says quite what I want it to/I'm not sure what I want it to be saying. But I thought I would share it anyway. Insight into the process or something like that...

6 November 2011

“Like legendary things they passed along the backs of the houses, putting up their grey shapeless tents in the grey evenings. They came as quietly as rain, and went away like mists drifting.”

—Lord Dunsany, The King of Elfland’s Daughter

The morning raindrops tremble on the roses

like love on the lips of young romantics.

The sky is a steady grey; they’ve nowhere to look

but each other’s eyes, seeking reassurance

that this is the longed for dream come to pass.

But even when the rains have turned to mist

and the roses have been dug up for a cornfield,

the dream remains, pitching its tent

in the twilight, grey to darkness with barely

a flicker of hope that the quest will be fulfilled.

Later, in comfortable sitting rooms they say,

“It is nice to know someone is still out there

pursuing the quest, but thank goodness

we have put such dreams from our minds

in exchange for the ease of this glowing hearth.”

They sing about those grey wanderers with starry eyes

(for the stars have long been lost in the rain and mist),

but barely notice the tents at the edges of the fields.

They cannot bear to look any longer for the hope from

beyond the fields they know; the heartache might return.

 

~~~

In other news: Pecans, oranges, tangerines, sugar cane, leafy greens, butternut squash, and root vegetables are in season now and when you live in Georgia this means deliciousness. Also cotton, but that is not to be eaten. I snack on farmer's market pecans and lunch on citrus from my co-worker's backyard. I make green salads and roast the vegetables. Temperatures remain in the 70s most days. Early mornings are often foggy. The leaves of the deciduous trees (which is probably less than half the trees I see on my walks to and from work, but still...) have finally turned and cover the street gutters and sidewalks. There will be more posts on things such as the edibility of acorns and the Savannah Children's Book Festival, one of the largest such festivals on the eastern seaboard. Face it, you wish you lived here, too.