Sample Poems by Richard Moore
Burials
The children grown
to rage, disaster,
having long known
they wouldn't last her,
declared my sweet,
my erstwhile lover:
Our life? Complete.
Finished now. Over.
Therefore we sever.
Such things, diminished,
far one, but never,
we have found, finished.
To the archives
that wrench and rend
of broken lives
there is no end.
Still, still they haunt us,
in every breath
breathe on us, taunt us,
dance on our death.
On Looking into the Neighbor's Grounds
To the great evergreen that seemed to prop
the sky above their windows, by their door
stand quiet watch, and in the high winds roar
with fury that no force, it seemed, could stop,
a truck with a long, elbowed arm to lop
branches has come. A man and his saw soar
into dark places no man touched before,
the whole trunk strip to the top, take the top. . .
The crew gather the trash (that's how they get
their living) drag it, lift it up, and strew it
into the chip machine without regret.
Sentimentality, of course, to rue it.
The tree had to come down. It's done. And yet,
oughtn't they say a prayer before they do it?
Window Seat
As gradually
the plane descends,
passing full moon
over dark earth
down there, flashes,
silver flashes,
again, again,
the moon in ponds,
in rivers, lakes,
discovered thus,
shines back at us.
I look around.
Strangers there read
or sleep. No one
sees; I, alone. . .
Autumn Chore
Would that I could inside, tucked in, doze:
not wrestle old, rotting storm windows.
Well, it's appropriate, it's true.
The old wrestler's rotting too.
I can see, through them, death draw near.
This job measures me every year.
Ordering Information: Bookstores and Individuals