Poem: The Passing

It's always dangerous to post a first draft of a poem, but in these months of writing in form, everything has been a first draft. Besides, I think two days of Dweebler's shenanigans are driving readers away. He is an intellectual low brow and delights in mocking my work. In any case, here's a poem I wrote very quickly this morning.


The Passing

I used to pay attention to the flickering moth
circling the yellow light and the dust
swirling in a rain of particles
at night, on the porch.

I used to watch fog creep up the valley,
swept up in its graceful blanketing
of the fir-green hillsides and the river
it entirely obscured.

It is not Sehnsucht that I seek, not the pull
of regret in the gut like having been in love
and having your love fail. It is more
that I don’t pay attention.

There is no poetry left in me,
no magic words to roll around my tongue
until they connect with my feet
and we are one.

I don’t play the guitar much, either.
My soft fingers recoil
from the wires that sing;
I listen to the radio.


A bit elegaic, I think, but few of my friends continued to play the guitar into their fifties. I have. But as this poem demonstrates, I lack magic in my life. Yet part of that is surely due to the onset of benefits from my new antidepressant, Cymbalta. It has really quieted my brain. I'm able to read again. Maybe someday I'll be up for reading poetry again. There is magic there, but it takes some work.

All for today,

CE