End of the Comedy by Louis Untermeyer
End of the Comedy
Louis UntermeyerEleven o’clock, and the curtain falls.
The cold wind tears the strands of illusion;
The delicate music is lost
In the blare of home-going crowds
And a midnight paper.The night has grown martial;
It meets us with blows and disaster.
Even the stars have turned shrapnel,
Fixed in silent explosions.
And here at our door
The moonlight is laid
Like a drawn sword.
MARGINALIA
So much flood in Mindanao. So much deaths. How life really is: one night you go to bed, and a great wall of water arrives at your door while you sleep, and nature takes what’s hers, and you are drowning, no, swimming with your eyes closed, your body limp, to the end. The day after: bodies caked to the earth, and you can’t tell now whether it’s tears or the rain that’s on your cheeks.
ABOUT LOUIS UNTERMEYER
Louis Untermeyer, born October 1, 1885, in New York City, was a poet, essayist, critic, and anthologist. The author and editor of many poetry collections, including the popular anthology of children’s verse, The Golden Treasury of Poetry (Golden Press, 1959), he served as the fourteenth Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, known today as the United States Poet Laureate. Untermeyer died on December 18, 1977, in Newtown, Connecticut. (Source)
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ENDNOTES
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