After Yeats Poem by Brian Hooper

AFTER YEATS

Chilled champagne awaited them,
a platoon of attentive captains and waiters
standing by to assure
that their glasses never emptied.

An unctuous manager extended
personal felicitations of the house
and a sumptuous, gout-inviting succession of
mouth-watering comestibles proceeded to
rain down on them like the
fortuitous bounty of a culinary god.

Scarcely having breath to speak
between bites and gulps,
throwing himself into the
consumption of the feast with
Bacchanalian abandon.

The champagne carbonated
the shadow of doom that had
dogged their last few days and
effervesced it to oblivion.

Around them the room
seemed impossibly lithe
and gay and
filled with light,
women glowing with Athenian glamour, the
men fortified by some Herculean ideal.

What a place!
What a city,
what a dynamic race of people!

It wasn’t until an ambrosian flamb? of
cherries, meringue, and vanilla ice cream
had landed in front of them that
the weightless balloon of his
undivided pleasure
begin to sink back into the
range of conscious awareness.

The dinner was not yet at an end
and already felt like a dream, for
he knew that the moment their discussion,
which up to the supernatural dessert
had been as carefree as
a clergyman’s Monday,
turned back to the life
that awaited them
outside of this cloistered Olympus,
the bill would
become due in more ways than one.

Bio:

Brian Hooper received his B.A. in American Studies from Washington &
Lee University and his M.Phil. in Literary Studies from the Chinese
University of Hong Kong. He is a recent graduate of the Harvard Law
School, where he was Executive Editor and Deputy Editor-in-Chief of
the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy. He is currently an
Associate at a Washington, DC-based law firm.

Poem about This House or Home Poem by James Nicosia

This House

This house–
It stands like a life–breathing, beckoning
with a spirit that grew straight on earthy ground.

It listened in joy to voices of home.

It knows loneliness from memories it feels–
Sheltering through calm and storm.

This house–
Holds on, Longing to understand, to tell you a
million things.

It cries with eyes watching,wondering
looking out through windows now unadorned.

This house–
It reaches, it now waits, for family to warm.

James V Nicosia
***

poem drinking alone drinking poem by Joan Pond

I sat alone drinking a Margaux, Imperiale
by Joan Pond

I sat alone drinking a Margaux, Imperiale.
At three thousand a bottle,
it was described as a classic red
with vanilla-scented nose.
Having a ripe black fruit,
it held a firm and structured finish.
Along with Toll House Cookies
I emptied the bottle,
noting the ruby-red colour staining the sink.
A good wine to drink with dessert,
especially while listening to Beethoven”s Seventh.
The Allegretto was so memorable,
I wondered;
was it the wine or the cookies?

***

Poem What Should I do Poem by Joan Pond

And So I Called A Taxidermist
by Joan Pond

A sudden snow squall as we headed to Maine.
Another weekend of Paul asking,
when are you moving in?
Much silence as snow fell.
Pines appeared
as Crest-coated toothbrushes.
I laughed at the ceiling fan,
circulating mephitic air;
snow shoes on the wall,
and all the things that made
this place extemely, him.
There was no room for me
unless I was mounted to a wall.
And so I called a taxidermist,
asking,
what I should do.

***

Penance Poem by Joan Pond

Penance
by Joan Pond

I don”t miss your touch,
your house,
or the mouse you caught in your trap.
It was upside down and dead.
A grey puff of head under a wire.
You complained it ate the cheese,
and you”d have to re-load the trap.
It”s tiny pink hands,
as an aborted child holding on
for dear life.
You simply shucked it out the door.
I left shortly, thereafter,
still mobile.
Feeling somewhat trapped,
in this purgatory or hell.
Why couldn”t I tell you,
I felt just like that mouse?

***

cubicle poem by Joan Pond

Where To Go
by Joan Pond

How many corporate Rest Rooms must I endure?
Questioning myself;
examining a face in the mirror.
Looking forlorn and asking,
what am I doing here?
I washed my hands,
not wanting to return to my cubby hole.
Surrounded by white tile,
I realized
the devil hadn”t taken my soul.
I”d given it willingly to these companies.
Mutatis, mutandis,
going to and fro.
It was a mutual agreement,
yet I”m forlorn;
not knowing where to go.

***