Wednesday, January 18, 2017

Come Thoughts

On the Difficulties of Writing a Sonnet at Home
by Anne Higginson Spicer


Come thoughts, for you must muster on parade,
A sonnet on the rain, my fancy orders.
(We'll have to sell the house or take in boarders
If things keep soaring skyward, I'm afraid.)
The rain—I'll make it spatter in a glade
Where larches tall o'er spreading flowers are warders.
(The old provision dealers are such hoarders;
It's all their fault that prices high have stayed.)
The rain, down-dropping in a scented wood.
(That recipe for scrapple sounded good.)
The rain, it rings with elfin laughter running.
(This pattern for my new frock will be stunning.)
The rain, where breezes sing and zephyrs laugh.
(Our oil stock cut its dividends in half!)

Poems about writing itself are difficult to do, in part because writing on its own is not a particularly interesting process, but this one works splendidly. I particularly like the repetition of 'the rain' as the poet keeps having to start up the poem again.