Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, EDWARD GRAVES, by ANDREW NELSON LYTLE


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

EDWARD GRAVES, by                    
First Line: Here where the honey-suckle vines grow wan
Last Line: The table set, and jane run off with a show.
Subject(s): Betrayal; Love - Loss Of


Here where the honey-suckle vines grow wan,
Besieged by bugs that suck their green leaves yellow,
Well darned in sixty-odd winters' ruts and lines,
Sits old Graves on his porch all kinds of weather,
And ponders with his outside eyes turned in,
While mongrel hens seek out with lowered beaks
The bugs, well-filled with honey blood and bloom.

The browning honey-horns droop and faint,
Exhale in rainbow drops a timorous essence,
And spend their whiff of fragrance all unheeded
On lustful winds who whirl far to the South,
Heated with expectation of lying that night
On the voluptuous breast of weeping willow,
Flowing its hair beside some moon-lit river.

It hasn't always been like this with Edward Graves! --
He used to climb the top of Pilot's Knob
To see fresh color poured in the morning sky,
Or watch at eve the sparks fly out and hit the dusk
As the Master Mechanic ground the sun between
The flinty sides of distant jagged hills
To shine and clean it for the coming day.

What changed him so?
One evening he came to supper a trifle late,
And found the meat still frying on the stove,
The table set, and Jane run off with a show.





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