‘From the Reveries of a Gentleman’ and Other Poems

From the Reveries of a Gentleman

Where can that good soul have been,
rain pelting, sun blazing,
with ink horn at the ready
by a tavern table, or else,
easy among crooks, barons, varlets,
he slept under the staircase in a château,
and sang to the lute, coming to be,
the music, weightless and strict,
he found in a snowflake.

How did Pergolesi fight his disease
just long enough, a spider’s web hangs
in one corner of that room.

The ragtime composer spent nights underground.
I hope the customers had gone.
Air, now clearing of its gunshot aroma
...