by phillipw | Oct 21, 2019 | WH, WI, WO
Father’s Voice I can’t remember what my father said Except when he was storytelling, or Declaiming poetry, or when his head Was full of politics or God. His store Of beauty came in tales, or ringing lines Of loveliness and joy, and plots he spun, And...
by phillipw | Oct 14, 2019 | VE, WI
“The Most Beautiful Life in History” (Oscar Wilde on the life of Paul Verlaine) Wilde’s entertaining Magdalen French did not Amuse Verlaine. The fireworks of those words Were sparkling like champagne but they meant squat To Paul—or were as...
by phillipw | Sep 28, 2019 | LO, RI, VE, WI
Repentance = Looking Backward You know how funny that it was in years Gone by when films on reels could be re-run Backwards? An actress’s glycerine tears Could crawl back up into her eyes. What fun! Ha Ha, funny, yes. And yet . . . sometimes life Runs backwards,...
by phillipw | Aug 18, 2019 | LO, WI
I Took Aunt Wilma to Lorena’s Grave Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem I took Aunt Wilma to Lorena’s grave, But first we’d gone to Walmart where she chose A dark gardenia. I became her...
by phillipw | Aug 18, 2019 | LO, NI, SI, WI
Aunt Wilma Forces Me ..to Plant a Gardenia on Lorena’s Grave Aunt Wilma is second from the left What happens to a voice when it is dead? The vocal cords will rot, of course, the lungs Will shrivel, wither. In a coffin bed The voice will evanesce like...
by phillipw | Jul 8, 2019 | RI, WI
[Arthur Rimbaud and Oscar Wilde were born four days apart from each other. They both died and are buried in France. Wilde arrived as a student at Oxford at the same time that Rimbaud was abandoning poetry and teaching French in the large house of his employer in...
