Pawn Chorus

Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem

The animals produce their poetry:

The whales sing out slow-motion melodies

Across the ocean depths and widths; the sea

Spreads out the song, the chanting to appease

The other lonely whales with music’s notes;

The frog adopts a meditative pose,

Front feet as Buddha-like in trance, then bloats

Out croaks, and croaks, and croaks that sound like prose

To us but sound like villanelles to him;

The skylark and the nightingale begin

At separate times to sing their sexy hymn;

The animals sing out against all sin.

  A man begins his serenade at dawn

    Pretending he is more than passion’s pawn.