Poetry Saved by Photographs and Words of Memory
It hardly matters if his verse is great,
Carved lines, bronze poetry, immortal stuff,
Or not. Brooke’s like a surfer on the spate
Of swollen wave tops. Killing beauty’s tough.
It lingers on in culture’s core. His face
Is like blue music that turns ho-hum lines
To force, an opera tenor in far space,
So far beyond us that a prophet’s signs
Cannot compete. His face and flowing hair
Are greater than those Everest mountain waves
Of curl and foam off Waikiki. That pair
Of eyes saves sonnets from the threat of graves.
His poetry becomes the sacrifice
A Toltec priest lifts after slashed knife’s slice.
~ Phillip Whidden