what's o'clock
91
Magnolias, pyrus japonicas, azaleas,
Flaunting their scattered blooms with the same bravura
That lords and ladies used in the prison of the Conciergerie.
You were meant to be so gay, so sophisticated, and you are so sad,
Sad as the tomb crouched amid your tangled growth,
Sad as the pale plumes of the Spanish moss
Slowly strangling the live-oak trees.
Flaunting their scattered blooms with the same bravura
That lords and ladies used in the prison of the Conciergerie.
You were meant to be so gay, so sophisticated, and you are so sad,
Sad as the tomb crouched amid your tangled growth,
Sad as the pale plumes of the Spanish moss
Slowly strangling the live-oak trees.
Sunset wanes along the quiet river.
The afterglow is haunted and nostalgic,
Over the yellow woodland it hangs like the dying chord of a funeral chant;
And evenly, satirically, the mosses move to its ineffable rhythm,
Like the ostrich fans of palsied dowagers
Telling one another contentedly of the deaths they have lived to see.
The afterglow is haunted and nostalgic,
Over the yellow woodland it hangs like the dying chord of a funeral chant;
And evenly, satirically, the mosses move to its ineffable rhythm,
Like the ostrich fans of palsied dowagers
Telling one another contentedly of the deaths they have lived to see.
