Seventy-Six

Music: Prelude in E major
By Dimitri Shostakovich. Sequenced by J. Marques.

Alpha List Number Poems  Contents Home Copyright by Nicholas Gordon

Seventy-six is steadfastly old fashioned, Ever certain of his old-world ways. Vested in the truth of what he knows, Each parable in place, he comes and goes, Not seeing what his landscape overlays, The stream that underneath the ice still flows. Yet only what he ordered meets his gaze.   So is his understanding strictly rationed, In keeping with the passion of his pose, X-ing out whatever time betrays.