Second Edit: Professor of Poetics

[Richard]

Professor of Poetics
For Richard Marchand

Just a memory now,
part of a cruel dream;
forever far,
yet always close.

He would lecture
about the clumsiness
of clichés,
“Grey leaden sky is meaningless.”

he would talk
of how poems were like candy
(so sweet sounding
in our mouths),

and he would also scare away
young poets
by dissecting their lines
like a mad surgeon.
His plain pencil
a scalpel,
most of his surgeries
unwanted.

Still, he taught me,
and prolonged my dream of poetics:
a cruel dream,
forever far, yet always close.

First Edit:

Professor of Poetics

He is just a memory now,
part of a cruel dream;
forever far,
yet always close.

He would lecture
about the clumsiness
of clichés,
“Grey leaden sky
is meaningless,” he would say,

he would talk
of how poems were like candy
(so sweet sounding
in our mouths),

and he would also scare away
young poets
by dissecting their lines
like a mad surgeon,
his plain pencil
a scalpel,
most of his surgeries
unwanted.

Still, he taught me,
and prolonged my dream of poetics:
a cruel dream,
forever far, yet always close.

Original:

Professor of Poetics

he is just a memory now-
part of a cruel dream
forever far
yet always close

he would lecture
about the clumsiness
of clichés:
“Grey leaden sky
is meaningless,” he would say

he would talk
of how poems were like candy
so sweet sounding
in our mouths

he would also scare away
young poets
by dissecting their lines
like a mad surgeon
his plain pencil
a scalpel
most of his surgeries
unwanted

he never made steel
like my father
he never waited a table
like my mother
but he influenced me

he taught me
and prolonged my dream of poetics:
a cruel dream
forever far
yet always close