by phillipw | Mar 15, 2020 | AE, BE, ES, MA
Troy in New Orleans, Manhattan, or London So I found “Helen” sitting in a streetcar; the Dionysian revels of her court were transferred to a Metropolitan roof garden with a jazz orchestra;and the katharsis of the fall of Troy I saw approximated in the recent World...
by phillipw | Mar 6, 2020 | AE, BE, ES, MA
Blond and Black: Victor in the Rare Books and Music Reading Room That blond one now has risen in my mind. The sight that I remember most is blond, Blond curls, a curving beauty that might blind Unwary men, a loveliness beyond The fatal sight of Gorgon snakes. His...
by phillipw | Mar 2, 2020 | AE, AR, ES, PO
The Lost One “Master Alfred de Musset says great artists … belong to space, to the universe, to anything infinite.” ~ Mehmet Murat Ildan I could not give an outline of him, for how Could I begin, or end? A paradox Is all that could...
by phillipw | Feb 10, 2020 | AE, BE, BR, ES, MA
Ashurbanipal Reincarnated At a Desk in Rare Books and Music A sternness in the beauty of his nose, His eyebrows and the arch above them, Its sweeping, upward, back—these all compose An epic that should wear a diadem. Its jewels should be from Asia and the isles Of...
by phillipw | Dec 26, 2019 | AE, BE, DE, ES, PE
Easter Peonies Pink peonies are dying. Only those Most hidden in the shades from one near bush Hold on to sturdy hope, to lingering rose Determination not to wilt. These push With frilled resistance, blowse-like guimpes, against That insubstantial...
by phillipw | Dec 15, 2019 | AE, BE, ES
On the Right Hand of God, the Father Almighty The pheasant stalks the hoar-frost farmer’s field, But early morning’s backlighting shines strong, So blackest silhouette is this dawn’s yield. No. Wait. Pure ugliness does not belong To spring. A moment...
