Ode to
Nan Min - IX
(Sonnet to Nan Min and Horst Rutsch)
Procrastination my resolve defeats
To follow in the path of hallowed feet:
The trinity of Shelley, Byron, Keats,
English exemplars of the bardic feat.
Poets in pilgrimage to Italy,
Their rite of passage, each must undergo
(Though from the North, cold winds blew bitterly
And Tuscany lay buried under snow).
Fair Florence my two dearest friends beheld
While in the New World's barrenness I tarried.
For I, my self, myself from self withheld
While routine rigmarole my hours carried.
In future, to repair my wit's disease,
I pray each opportunity to seize.
December 2002
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