The Song Collector
Sidewalk feet beat stairs on charged waters.
The rhythm--complicated; the horn in "G."
But a half human voice delivers him high above sea he can't swim
And below the sky so scented
And damp it feels like the space in a yawn.
Indeed, the young man feels breathed upon
And wholly swallowed, not just by the song,
But the night itself.
Even the moon, dry like aspirin,
Becomes digestible, losing perimeter.
Still, the young man stands.
Shoulders--heavy--as if he were a gull,
Circling the stern like a soul above flesh.
And though he cannot see the deck man,
He knows the deck man--
Too big for a uniform--sees him.
Words like "wings" and "Kingston" scrape
Against the North Atlantic air.
So the young man remains.
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Submitted on May 01, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 37 sec read
- 2 Views
Quick analysis:
Scheme | ABCDEFGHIJKLMNNCOPQ |
---|---|
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 693 |
Words | 126 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 19 |
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"The Song Collector" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 13 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/87939/the-song-collector>.
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