5.
At the sight of her hair falling,
A young girl cries out sharply.
6.
A woman is moving.
A woman's new hairdo is not moving.
7.
So which one do you prefer:
The beauty of anticipation,
The beauty of suggestion,
(This will look just real fine on you . . . )
Or the reality of reflection
When you hair is scattered across the floor?
8.
O thin ladies at Darlene's Salon,
Why are you all platinum blondes?
9.
I know your local accents
Your slangy rhythms and double negatives:
I don't know nothing!
You say. You who are involved
In all the knowing of this town.
(after "13 Ways of Looking at a Blackbird" by Wallace Stevens)
4 comments:
The shadow of her equipage
did not resemble a hairdo.
I love it, Lyle.
I like # 5. It has an austere beauty that puts me in mind of the early films of Mizoguchi.
(I published a parody of this poem in Stones, 1969. I'd better not give the title in this family situation. Suffice to say Holly Stevens' kettle boiled over, toil and trouble, so wonderful to remember, it almost makes one wish to start all over with this writing thing, and do it as wrong as possible! ... No, wait, already did that.)
And I get one step closer to understanding ...
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