Classic and Contemporary Poetry
THE JOB, by CHARLES BADGER CLARK JR. Poet's Biography First Line: But, god, it won't come right! It won't come right! Last Line: from sky lines and wood smoke. Alternate Author Name(s): Clark, Badger Subject(s): Creation; Lightning; Rain; Storms; Thought; Thunder; Lightning Rods; Thinking | ||||||||
But, God, it won't come right! It won't come right! I've worked it over till my brain is numb. The first flash came so bright, Then more ideas after itflash! flash!I thought it some New constellation men would wonder at. Perhaps it's just a fireworkflash! fizz! spat! Then darker darkness and scorched pasteboard and sour smoke. But, God, the thought was great, The scheme, the dreamwhy, till the first charm broke The thing just built itself while I, elate, Laughed and admired it. Then it stuck, Half done, the lesser half, worse luck! You see, it's dead as yeta frame, a bodyand the heart, The soul, the fiery, vital part To give it life, is what I cannot get. I've tried You know ittried to catch live fire And pawed cold ashes. Every spark has died. It won't come right! I'd drop the thing entire, OnlyI can't! I love my job. You, who ride the thunder, Do you know what it is to dream and drudge and throb? I wonder. Did it come at you with a rush, your dream, your plan? If so, I know how you began. Yes, with rapt face and sparkling eyes, Swinging the hot globe out between the skies, Marking the new seas with their white beach lines, Sketching in sun and moon, the lightning and the rains, Sowing the hills with pines, Wreathing a rim of purple round the plains. I know you laughed then, while you caught and wrought The big, swift, rapturous outline of your thought. And then Men! I see it now. O God, forgive my pettish row! I see your job. While ages crawl Your lips take laboring lines, your eyes a sadder light, For man, the fire and flower and center of it all Man won't come right! After your patient centuries, Fresh starts, recastings, tired Gethsemanes And tense Golgothas, he, your central theme, Is just a jangling echo of your dream. Grand as the rest may be, he ruins it. Why don't you quit? Crumple it all and dream again! But no; Flaw after flaw, you work it out, revise, refine Bondage, brutality, and war, and woe, The sot, the fool, the tyrant and the mob Dear God, how you must love your job! Help me, as I love mine. FROM SKY LINES AND WOOD SMOKE. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...MILLE ET UN SENTIMENTS (PREMIERS CENTS) by DENISE DUHAMEL SUNDAY AFTERNOON by CLARENCE MAJOR I BROOD ABOUT SOME CONCEPTS, FOR EXAMPLE by ALICIA SUSKIN OSTRIKER EASY LESSONS IN GEOPHAGY by KENNETH REXROTH GENTLEMEN, I ADDRESS YOU PUBLICLY by KENNETH REXROTH ON FLOWER WREATH HILL: 1 by KENNETH REXROTH A BORDER AFFAIR by CHARLES BADGER CLARK JR. A BAD HALF HOUR by CHARLES BADGER CLARK JR. A COWBOY'S PRAYER (WRITTEN FOR MOTHER) by CHARLES BADGER CLARK JR. |
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