|
|
Gardner McFall
Robert Frost's poem, "Nothing Gold Can Stay," informs Gardner McFall's
"Lesson." Here, she incorporates the final line of Frost's poem in her response to life's transience.
Lesson
Everyone's enrolled in the school of loss,
the instruments of study, heart and mind,
applied to life experience. Me? I've been
a student a long time; I'm taking too long
to graduate. How crossed my accomplished principal
has grown, weary of making me write
"Nothing gold can stay" as many times as it takes.
Pages accrue on my desk in the waning sun.
When she dismisses me, my cramped hand aches.
I almost believe repetition has driven
the lesson home, till outside under the stars
and the moon's two profiled faces locked
in a white, new kiss, a reasonable mind is
helpless to tamp the heart's rich howl.
Gardner McFall is the author of a volume of poems, THE PILOT'S DAUGHTER (Time Being Books, l996); her recent work has appeared in THE ATLANTIC
MONTHLY, SOUTHWEST REVIEW, and PEQUOD.
|
Back
Home
Next
|