H. Palmer Hall

Anti-Romanticism

  

Again, from the other side of the emblazoned
Horizon, there’s a root cause of unhappiness, as
It spreads itself in myriad, sundry directions,
At the point that we believe in its ageless existence.

 

By desire, by its drifting effect it has on the world,
The fullness and dullness of theories collide,
The insane empathy it takes to heart as it shapes
A love for flowers; the basis for breathing in symbols.

 

Eliot issued the plea: Coker, which he knew, stood
Cold, blasted by earnest wind, during an evening
Which defied memory. A taste of destiny stood
Still in sad colors. Those daffodils are pondered again.

 

***

 

Perception of Ponds

 

The ripples came and went like clear fine gems,
Spreading out from each point, each becoming

 

Circles of indecision. Assuming it was
All rain, all pristine  drops on the smooth floor

 

Of water, I stood and thought of gray times
That sparkle in the shallow body at dawn.

 

Draconian reflections stopped short. They emerged
As careful nuances on the brain.

 

They say standing water attracts mosquitoes;
Nothing has come of that narrow liquid but tropes.

***

 

Clouds Making Pictures

There is insistence in the rain. After all,
It’s a boon, being laid out with discretion,
As always hard and soft in the proper places,
No matter how devious the ground might assume it is.
Hagborn darkness. Nearly impenetrable. Then
Hammily washing everything that erupts.
And now, those same promises achieve a cumulous
Effect; the promises of earth as dioptric help,
Gemmed fully before it can fall and grow insecure,
And act like us, at the end of speculative rope.
Draw from it what you will. With its sound, rain has won,
As it has its way for long, brazen hours. It was expected,
Like a dark play bolstered by cold dark applause,
Or paintings by Rothko strewn in wet alleyways.

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