Tonight No Poetry Will Serve
Saw you walking barefoot
taking a long look
at the new moon's eyelid
later spread
sleep-fallen, naked in your dark hair
asleep but not oblivious
of the unslept unsleeping
elsewhere
Tonight I think
no poetry
will serve
Syntax of rendition:
verb pilots the plane
adverb modifies action
verb force-feeds noun
submerges the subject
noun is choking
verb disgraced goes on doing
now diagram the sentence
Credits
"Tonight No Poetry Will Serve." Copyright © 2016 by the Adrienne Rich Literary Trust. Copyright (c) 2011 by Adrienne Rich, from COLLECTED POEMS: 1950--2012 by Adrienne Rich. Used by permission of W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.