Irreverence
I dreamt I was almost
a woman, but when I woke
I made love with a spinster
who whistled anthems
in the dark, then I dreamt
again of New York, of
frantic cab rides and
mysterious women
in raincoats, of winds
lifting dried leaves
from gutters to curbs
in symphonic swirls,
and of a vault of a room
in the West Side Y
where an aspiring
baritone’s scales and
drunks beat on the door
each night like
African drums, or
a headache, I tell you,
or heart.
About this poem
From the Anonymous Issue of Antenna, winter 1981. A small press long defunct. From a trip to the American Letters conference in Saratoga Springs, 1980. For an old friend, JM.
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Written on January 01, 1979
Submitted by GRobbie on November 14, 2021
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 27 sec read
- 3 Views
Quick analysis:
Scheme | ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOGPQPRS |
---|---|
Closest metre | Iambic trimeter |
Characters | 449 |
Words | 90 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 21 |
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"Irreverence" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 19 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/114001/irreverence>.
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