I see where' Patrick is coming from, Max. As that is complete, but then there's the sequence, almost of separate poems on a theme.
But I could see just attaching the final section to the first, & that would be a sharper piece. On the other hand, there are insights throughout (from our old POV)...
Doug
On Dec 18, 2013, at 2:42 AM, Patrick McManus <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Cheers Max -I find that the three first verses are complete in themselves
> -and a bit of a problem continuing still it's probably just me -failing fast
> :-)
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Poetryetc: poetry and poetics [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
> Behalf Of Max Richards
> Sent: 18 December 2013 09:24
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: 'Seldom'
>
> Seldom
>
> Seldom now do I
> darken old doorways,
> a shadow of my
>
> former shadowy
> self, sidling along
> side streets or
>
> head down in
> thoroughfares
> that once I strode up.
>
> *
>
> My office door
> resembled that one,
> happy with obligation.
>
> My successor
> may well oblige
> more with wise succour.
>
> Teaching is
> a commodity
> utterly invisible.
>
> As she may know
> already entering
> mid-career
>
> wondering about
> energies dispersed
> in service.
>
> Invisible ex-teacher,
> I won't knock.
> She may be writing.
>
> *
>
> Hills I avoid unless
> it's a downward slope,
> submitted to tentatively.
>
> Steep I once did with pride
> as if youth were virtue.
> Overtaken on all sides
>
> by youth I mutter:
> your time is short.
> Yet mine is shorter.
>
> *
>
> I seem without intending
> to have turned
> off the busy main road
>
> into a no exit street.
> None of us go out
> by the way we came in.
>
> Some plan their send-off
> or have it planned for them.
> Some outlive all
>
> who might mourn for them.
> It matters little.
> What does matter?
>
> *
>
> Should we meet here
> by chance, after a few words
> you'd hear me say,
>
> Well, I'd better
> be heading back.
> Back? Which way is that?
>
Douglas Barbour
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Swept snow, Li Po,
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