I Took Emerson Off the Shelf

“For it is not metres, but a metre-making argument that makes a poem--a thought so passionate and alive that like the spirit of a plant or an animal it has an architecture of its own”- Emerson Your smile is selfish and sensual; A poet, with Apollo’s privilege, Dressed in the loneliness of civility Where is the fire, the flame, The grab for passion, That goes beyond the fame Of a painted world. Show me how the greening earth makes you feel, How the curdled fields of winter Light your dreams; show me these things, Before a fairy fire, so I know You are more alive, than you seem.