BRAVE POET JACK KEROUAC
In a jammed New Haven room, Jack Kerouac unshaven and breezy,
Mount Tamalpais, wakens and screams, Satori!
EMILY DICKINSON, INVENTOR OF MAGIC (1830-1886)
Dazzling Emily Dickinson
Contrives her poems with Moon born of elation and Sun.
JOHN LENNON, TRAPEZE ARTIST OF WORDS (1940-1980)
DANTE ALIGHIERI IN LOVE (1265-1321)
Dante takes 100 cantos to declare his romance.
Exiled in Heaven’s circles, Beatrice gains one shoddy glance.
T.S. ELIOT (1888-1965)
Even high Priest Eliot in Love (+ hatred in his racial pee)
Knows when Death Ship anchors near, it’s good to flee.
JOHN DONNE & REVEREND DEACON JOHN DONNNE (1572-1631)
Metaphysical Jack Donne is wild lover. Later writes, “No man is an island…
for whom the Bell tolls; it tolls for thee.”
As Dean of St Paul’s, he confesses his sinful soul is like “spitting Jews’ impiety.[1]
[1] Holy Sonnets, X!. The wondrous poet was a pious anti-Semite, unlike magnificent George Herbert, the most thoughtful and imaginative poet of his generation, who honored the Jews of his day and condemned their persecutions.
CHARLES BAUDELAIRE (1821-1867)
“Soon we shall plunge into the frozen gloom.
I already hear her funereal doom.”
MARINA TSVETAYEVA (1892-1941)
Deeply experimental, Marina is thrilling to read.
Stalin exiles her to Yelabuga. Hangs herself as a maid.
PABLO NERUDA (1904-1973)
Our abundant champion of surreal social amazement,
Killed by Pinochet? Prostate cancer? Heart? So none could celebrate his death,
………he was left in a cage like excrement.
GERALD STERN (1924-)
Jerry is a magic Pittsburg street poet with
Dream, fists, & bravado. His global memory is myth.
ELIZABETH BISHOP (1911-1927)
Blessed with a precise pen of love and place at will,
Lowell asks marriage. She has her female lover in Brazil.