To keep from ending The story does everything it can, Careful not to overvalue Perfection or undervalue Perfect chance, As I am careful not to do in telling. By now a lot has happened: Bridges under the water, No time outs, Sinewy voices from under the earth Braiding and going straight up In a faint line. I modify to simplify, Complicate to clarify. If you want to know your faults, marry. If you want to know your virtues, die. Then the heroine, Who resembles you in certain particulars, Precipitates the suicide Of the author, wretchedly obscure, Of that slim but turgid volume, By letting slip: @3Real events don't have endings, Only the stories about them do@1. Used with the permission of Copper Canyon Press, P.O. Box 271, Port Townsend, WA 98368-0271, www.cc.press.org | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE SNOW-SHOWER by WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT THE MAID'S LAMENT; ELIZABETHAN by WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR AMORETTI: 68 by EDMUND SPENSER THE COTTON BOLL by HENRY TIMROD MYRTILLA by THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH SONNETS FOR NEW YORK CITY: 2. A POLITICAL 'BOSS' by ANNA HEMPSTEAD BRANCH |