Lowell Stone

“Oh Florence, Florence, patronessof the lovely tyrannicides!Where the tower of the Old Palacepierces the skylike a hypodermic needle,Perseus, David and Judith,lords and ladies of the Blood,Greek demi-gods of the Cross,rise sword in handabove the unshavenformless decapitationof the monsters, tubs of guts,mortifying chunks for the pack.Pity the monsters!Pity the monsters!Perhaps, one always took the wrong side -Ah, to have known, to have lovedtoo many David and Judiths!My heart bleeds for the monster.I have seen the Gorgon.The erotic terrorof her helpless, big-bosomed bodylay like slop.Wall-eyed, staring the despot to stone,her severed head swunglike a lantern in the victor’s hand.””

“Oh to break loose like the chinooksalmon jumping and falling back,nosing up to the impossiblestone and bone-crushing waterfall....Time to grub up and junk the year'soutput, a dead wood of dry verse:dim confession, coy revelation,liftings, listless self-imitation,whole days when I could hardly speak,came pluming home unshaven, weakand willing to read anyonethings done before and better done....””

“Fragment"What is poetry? Is it a mosaicOf coloured stones which curiously are wroughtInto a pattern? Rather glass that's taughtBy patient labor any hue to takeAnd glowing with a sumptuous splendor, makeBeauty a thing of awe; where sunbeams caught,Transmuted fall in sheafs of rainbows fraughtWith storied meaning for religion's sake.””