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What makes the good poem? I think I know.
First, what it's not about is isolation
From life: but lived; not merely presentation
In words, freed, squawking, always on the go,
That gather in numbers, safer being so;
But something awakened, in orchestration
Of the words to effect manifestation
Of a living thing, the poem, to flow,
From start to finish, as though words were just
The humble bearers, Cleopatra's barge,
Conveying beauty, meaning, but much more:
A life. With such integrity as must
Draw that respect the living command, or
Count for nothing, though it cling to the page. |
