The night attendant, a studious sophomore
Rouses from the mare’s nest of her drowsy head
Propped on “The Meaning of Meaning.”
Your nurse could only speak Italian
But after 20 minutes
I could imagine your “finals” week
And tears ran down my cheeks
She catwalks down our corridor
Azure day
Makes my agonized blue window bleaker
Crows maunder on the petrified fairway
Absence! My heart grows tense
As though a harpoon were sparring for the kill
(This seems, at times, a house for the mentally ill …)
What use is my sense of humor?
Three months. Three months. Three months!
Is Lily now herself again?
Dimpled with amusing exultation
My sister holds court in her bathtub
Our noses rub
Spring moved to summer
The rude, cold rain hurries the ambitious
Robert Lowell—Waking in the Blue, Sailing Home From Rapallo and Home After Three Months Away [paraphrased]
The night attendant, a studious sophomore Rouses from the mare’s nest of her drowsy head Propped on “The Meaning of Meaning.”
Your nurse could only speak Italian But after 20 minutes I could imagine your “finals” week And tears ran down my cheeks
She catwalks down our corridor Azure day Makes my agonized blue window bleaker Crows maunder on the petrified fairway Absence! My heart grows tense As though a harpoon were sparring for the kill (This seems, at times, a house for the mentally ill …) What use is my sense of humor? Three months. Three months. Three months! Is Lily now herself again? Dimpled with amusing exultation My sister holds court in her bathtub Our noses rub Spring moved to summer The rude, cold rain hurries the ambitious
Robert Lowell—Waking in the Blue, Sailing Home From Rapallo and Home After Three Months Away [paraphrased]