by phillipw | Jan 25, 2020 | DO, LO
The Gemini Most loves are lost the moment they are born. Their DNA contains the genes to doom Devotion. Bonded chromosomes are torn, Though only slightly. They become love’s tomb As well, simultaneous the death and birth. Invisible, a corpse is there...
by phillipw | Jan 25, 2020 | SE, SU
Prince of Silence “FIREBALL HORROR AT THE PALACE” ~ London Evening Standard, p. 1, February 9, 2016 He didn’t leave a note. He didn’t tell A soul. No whisper even from his death Was given as he left his private hell. The only message was the whooshing...
by phillipw | Jan 24, 2020 | RI, VE
Difficult to See Intimations of Immortality We ride past, jostling on the bus, and can’t Make out the wording on the plaque; so close, And yet importance can be missed. We pant To make connection and to get a dose Of greatness or at least of meaning. Paul Reached...
by phillipw | Jan 24, 2020 | IS, PR, RA
[This is about one of the guards at the entrance to the Rare Books and Music Reading Room.] Besides, I’m the Foreigner I like him for his gentle, almost sly Smile, nearly shy, but, no, not quite. A smile That’s mostly in the lips but in the eye Is boosted on a face...
by phillipw | Jan 24, 2020 | MU
The Muse Where silence is, no music can exist As long as quietude remains. Relief Comes flooding in a man who has been kissed By love or even lust as strong as grief. When silence is replaced by roaring sound, That sound we name amour, then need...
by phillipw | Jan 24, 2020 | CH, JE
The Long-haired One The long-haired man, the trouble-maker in A pose, yes, always; ever in those clothes That none of us would wear . . . he has that chin Held there too strong (as if he could depose Our ways with just his attitude) Or much too low (as if...
by phillipw | Jan 24, 2020 | RI, VE
Séance Verlaine was more a séance poet than A seer or prophetic voice. He saw The vestiges of love, a phantom man When love was gone, and souvenirs, not raw And brutal facts. Paul called up from his past Misshapen memories. He did not want To...
by phillipw | Jan 24, 2020 | OE, PR, RI, VE
The Deaths of Mad Queens The heroines in Racine’s tragedies Are monsters, dignities destroyed by heat Of passion harder than a marble frieze, Rock lust for man or boy. Queens’ hearts replete With rage and love, this royalty is blind As Oedipus’s eyes with jelly...
