My NY school was nothing like theirs--that legendary poetry clan
Four Harvard friends, who resolutely got lost in the experience
of poetry, painting, music, Jane, each other,
blurring creative conventions, like Rivers, Matisse

No, my school didn't care much for poetics,
Or find time to hail the literary mores of the Avant-Garde,
But in this volatile epoch of hijacked peacetime
The warring '40s of their youth seems more present than ever

Still, I am lost

Like sand, these four sifted through words, war, worlds
Sold on happinesss-in-pursuit, outside the herd
a familiar place for poets, artists, peacemakers,
then and now, bonding in prolific tryst clusters

Like a panacea for restless city writers, the NY School Poets
Found me, wandering towards the Hudson in an aesthetic haze
Tutelage slipping through my consciousness, and below
Liquid literary waves roll to shore, thick like Mercury

Still, I dive in

08/23/2005

Author's Note: One product of reading "The Last Avante-Garde" (Lehman)

Posted on 08/23/2005
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