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 travel to some unknown future, vast
And thrilling. Rather, yesterday should haunt
His heart till music had become extinct.
Paul read the palms to conjure yesteryear
And turn it into bittersweetness blinked
Away with aches more misty than a tear.
..Beside him and inside him strode a Gog
….And Magog, Arthur. Paul opted for fog.
