At the Old Poets Convention
Author: Bill Roberts
– to Helen, whose beauty is to me like those Nicean barks of yore…
At the Old Poets Convention
This year we elected
A new Heroic Poet to lead us
Into the uncertain stanzas ahead.
It was close, Edgar Allan Poe
Edging our Allen Ginsberg,
Whose rants most of us thought
To be too tired, predictable.
Time to return to Nevermore,
The tintinnabulation of the belles,
None finer than Annabel Lee,
Or so quoth the Raven.
Oh, this next glorious year
Should be like the good old
Days, days, days, days,
Days, days, days.
I saw thee once, Edgar Allan -
Once only – years ago.
You’ve returned to the Haunted
Palace, old time entombed forever.
(Published onlie in 2008 in Slow Trains)
Note: Can you tell I prefer Poe to Ginsberg? Truly, I like all poets and never met a poem I didn’t like. People who write poetry, good or not so good, are thinkers. You have to think before you write a poem. And, oh, it always helps if you have something of substance to say. What am I saying in this poem? Just a whimsical recalling of lines and words assembled as the Old Master, Edgar Allan, might have put them had the demons not gotten to him at so young an age. A highlight of my life was visiting Poe’s dormitory room at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. What an experience and what a beautiful place. I’m sure I saw his ghost, felt its presence anyway. And heard vaguely, off in the distance, the admonition….Nevermore.
