A poem!

The Core Media Forum
#1

I deny!

Two roads? Two roads?!

Not two say I, but a million
A billion, a trillion more than the
Eye can see, but seeing is not believing
And so I close my eye and take a step and listen

For the crunch of leaf or snap of twig or maybe,
Oh woe! Maybe, oh crushed desires, the sounds of
Gravel well walked, the no-sound sound of
Slow decline into walking with another and
Another by my side until they are gone
and another and another and I know not
To them the road is their own, they, blinkered
See me not, so I dive away! I am in
The woods and now!

Now I am on no path.
Now, I make my own!

#2

Whitman’s reply to Frost, it sounds like? You do a good imitation of Whitman’s voice: the references to nature, the whimsical direction of thought, and even the boisterousness. But the third stanza becomes too abstract and intellectually convoluted after line three. Trying to decipher it interferes with the pleasant stream of nature imagery and cheerful sentiment.

One of the things I need to remind myself is how <i>superficial</i> pre-20th century poetry was. Lots of pretty sound, lots of pretty imagery, but not much “depth” in a modern sense. Deep thoughts took thirty-line monologues to explore.

Anyway, I liked it, and I think Whitman is a good poet to imitate nowadays.