West and East
Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem
The best of western poetry brings stabs
Of truth and recognition to the lung
And heart. Those lines do not bring hardened scabs,
Though scars may well result, pale scars that young
Males might be nursing still when they are hit
By gold-tipped, sharpest love. Those lines return
To them the opposite of echoes, slit
The hearts prepared by lines to make men burn.
An Oriental poem acts more like
Cool observation’s immortality.
Its lines use more a taupe jade pen than spike
Or flame. They marshal calm frugality.
The eastern poet writes from focused head.
Ink writes supernal facts in infrared.
~ Phillip Whidden