blackbirdonline journalFall 2009  Vol. 8  No. 2
poetryfictionnonfictiongalleryfeaturesbrowse
GERALD STERN

I

                              XVIII
                                                                            He sprang forth from the Cosmos,
                              he didn’t just leave, he sprang forth most of the time
                              but this time he was Mozart and Oswald Spengler,
                              and Samuel Coleridge, for he had something over the
                              First, Second, and Third I.s whose Spenglers and
                              Mozarts were already buried, or digested,
                              or they were absorbed and they were accommodated,
                              the way it happens, and he was springing forth
                              unto the river and one thing was on his mind,
                              or he could have divided it in two although
                              to I. it seemed like one continual thing
                              and he couldn’t wait till he got back to his books
                              and only he wished he had his books while he stood
                              above the water, though he knew other waters
                              and he was never without a river. 
spacer

return to top