National Poetry Month, Day 26

[a_t_rain]

Because Edwin Arlington Robinson is so good, and so underrated.



Doctor of Billiards

Of all among the fallen from on high,
We count you last and leave you to regain
Your born dominion of a life made vain
By three spheres of insidious ivory.
You dwindle to the lesser tragedy —
Content, you say. We call, but you remain.
Nothing alive gone wrong could be so plain,
Or quite so blasted with absurdity.

You click away the kingdom that is yours,
And you click off your crown for cap and bells;
You smile, who are still master of the feast,
And for your smile we credit you the least;
But when your false, unhallowed laugh occurs,
We seem to think there may be something else.

Comments

[angua9.livejournal.com]

EAR is underrated! Even I tend to forget about him. Why is that? His stuff is great.

[gules]

oh, i love e.a. robinson! altho i feel his lyric poems, as a rule, are far outstripped by the longer ones, which is part of the problem—people haven't got the patience for epics these days, and being underrated is rather an inevitable consequence of being underread!

(having said that, of course, "eros turannos" is less than 50 lines, & amazing—the final couplet, with that "stairway to the sea / where down the blind are driven," makes me shudder every time. how so good, edwin, how so good?)