The Whispered Stain — a poem

“One scarlet flower is cast on the blanch-white stone.”

— Ezra Pound, Canto IV

 

 

The stain, the stain, a whispered —
no, a creatured thought that crawled
from the blanketed chambers.

Too easy to follow its rhythmic flow,
                                                                       ignore
questions of source, of purity, of alloy,
of intent; to trip the meanders, wave
at others oxbowed, becalmed in static
utterance — atonal life along a silent shore.

But what then?

Paddle, portage, prospect the driven
stream of unconsciousness.  Seek
golden answers to unexamined
life while the stain, the strain,
the whispered petals remain.

* * *

What comes of reading Pound!

Wrung Out: the Marine Layer of My Frontal Lobes — a poem

Is it that
the Sun has absented
its office, or did
“blanket coverage”
we were offered mean
perpetually overcast skies — damn
the unended,
unending
summer of gray!