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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
TIME AND THE PERFUME RIVER, by KAREN SWENSON Poet's Biography First Line: Small buddhas smile above their blooms Last Line: Along the curves of the perfume. Subject(s): Death; Vietnam; Vietnamese Conflict, 1961-1975; War; Dead, The | |||
Small Buddhas smile above their blooms on gilded family altars, glide along the curves of the Perfume, that river named before the dooms of war ripped Hue's old gilded hide and Buddhas' smiles above their blooms. The river waves are slapping tunes. Greens sputtering in a wok provide, along the curves of the Perfume, the smoke of incense. Children's spumes of laughter rock small boats whose guide is Buddha's smile above his blooms. Those years death rode the river's flume, his rotting incense justified along the curves of the Perfume by leaders' greed for power's boom. War's drowned now in the river's tide where Buddhas smile above their blooms along the curves of the Perfume. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...A FRIEND KILLED IN THE WAR by ANTHONY HECHT FOR JAMES MERRILL: AN ADIEU by ANTHONY HECHT TARANTULA: OR THE DANCE OF DEATH by ANTHONY HECHT CHAMPS D?ÇÖHONNEUR by ERNEST HEMINGWAY NOTE TO REALITY by TONY HOAGLAND |
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