Louise Bogan: Simple Autumnal

The measured blood beats out the year’s delay.
The tearless eyes and heart, forbidden grief,
Watch, the burned, restless, but abiding leaf,
The brighter branches arming the bright day.

The cone, the curving fruit should fall away,
The vine stem crumble, ripe grain knows its sheaf.
Bonded to time, fires should have done, be brief,
But, serfs to sleep, they glitter and they stay.

Because not last nor first, grief in its prime
Wakes in the day, and hears of life’s intent.
Sorrow would break the seal stamped over time
And set the baskets where the bough is bent.

Full season’s come, yet filled trees keep the sky
And never scent the ground where they must lie.

~~~~

Louise Bogan (1897 – 1970) was appointed the fourth Poet Laureate to the Library of Congress in 1945, and was the first woman to hold this title. Throughout her life she wrote poetry, fiction, and criticism, and became the regular poetry reviewer for The New Yorker. Dictionary of Literary Biography contributor Brett C. Millier described her as “one of the finest lyric poets America has produced.” He said, “the fact that she was a woman and that she defended formal, lyric poetry in an age of expansive experimentation made evaluation of her work, until quite recently, somewhat condescending.”

From Collected Poems of Louise Bogan 1923 – 1953 (Noonday Press, 1956). Included in Vox Populi for noncommercial educational purposes only.