Winter in Dupont (after Wilbur's "Fall in Corrales")

[dcmarti1]

(This is a shameless attempt to copy, to sound like, my fav modern poet: Richard Wilbur. It was written in the early 1990s. Dupont was the neighborhood I lived in at that time.)

 

Winter will be poetry

and the chill of snow's white treason,

with fettered gates securing me

in darkness and unreason.

 

Rhyme, all rhyme, on lovers' lips

must recreate the summer's peace

of shaded sun and fountained trips

before the frigid grey took lease.

 

The lights above my neighbor's door

will start to turn on early,

as if their tiny heat could bore

through coats of frost most burly.

 

By then the tales will have been told

how much of fall was wasted;

how many hurried dreams were sold;

how many foods yet untasted.

 

Desired sex -not satisfied!-

shall burn like haunts arboreal,

until warm mouths have justified

my use for men sartorial.

 

A dirty bed, the river sleeps

while defiant trains daily cross;

it seems that the commuting keeps

reclaiming time before its loss.

 

Remembered worlds both vague and bright

are meat upon the poet's bone.

Though winter now, still summer's fright:

I, and me, myselves, alone.

[dr_con]

Nice... Very Wilburesque... Enjoyed, most thoroughly... DC & J

[dcmarti1]

"Wilburesque" is one of the highest praises you could have made. Thank you.

[Benjamin]

This is fluid and most enjoyable poetry. I know you didn't ask for critique but the only places I faltered, were the last lines of stanzas 3 and 5 which seem (to me) rather awkard, as if to facilitate the rhyme. But hey! We all view things differently and my two-pennyworth doesn't change the overall quality of a fine piece of work. Best..B.

[dcmarti1]

To facilitate rhyme, indeed. I took absolutely NO offense. :)