Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, AFTER WHISTLER, by AGNES KENDRICK GRAY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

AFTER WHISTLER, by                    
First Line: This mezzo-tint of mist and smoke blue sir
Last Line: This river dusk to you.
Subject(s): Bridges


This mezzo-tint of mist and smoke blue air,
These gray blue waters, gray black cherry trees
Are Whistler's manner to the brushtip. . . these
And shore-lamps lit against the nearing night,
That lie in little broken lanes of light.

He would have washed these wistful colors in
With brooding hand and spirit edged and keen --
His vision and the subtle hour akin --
Seeing beyond the symbol the unseen,
The overtones of tint, the underglow
Which lends that nameless gleam of lustre-ware
To slow-rippled river there.

Blue-silver lights! He would have loved them so!
And that black bridge, long-spanned and low,
With the frail mist fringing the farther end.
What art he had for bridges -- skill to blend
Their arches into his backgrounds of blue air.

Swiftly he would have caught this nocturne mood,
This mood of mist and sky,
And held it in few strokes and fewer tones,
Set there
Below the blurred-in trees his Butterfly
And called it "Silver and Blue." . . .
Bridge-Builder of dreams, I dedicate
This river dusk to you.





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