Sunlight fades
the storefront full of magazines.
Month to month
they boss us — the covers,
they tell us
that if we want to get happy & alluring
(real happy, alluring sexually)
we must for goddamn sure
take up the breeding of Jack Russell terriers,
or else dig
ourselves
a little backyard fishpond.
Days of fish, days of dog, days of sex —
in that order, necessarily.
How brightly glistening in the sun
The woodland ivy plays!
While yonder beeches from their barks
Reflect his silver rays.
That sun surveys a lovely scene
From softly smiling skies;
And wildly through unnumbered trees
The wind of winter sighs:
Now loud, it thunders o'er my head,
And now in distance dies.
But give me back my barren hills
Where colder breezes rise;
Where scarce the scattered, stunted trees
Can yield an answering swell,
But where a wilderness of heath
Returns the sound as well.
If I had known
Two years ago how drear this life should be,
And crowd upon itself allstrangely sad,
Mayhap another song would burst from out my lips,
Overflowing with the happiness of future hopes;
Mayhap another throb than that of joy.
Have stirred my soul into its inmost depths,
If I had known.
