Before the Movies and TV
Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem
For Charles Randall Stanfield who also mentioned sex and other types of play and contemplation of beauty
Both Bollywood and Hollywood—and now
Black Nollywood we have. We used to wait
Beside a lake or stream, beneath a bough
Of oak that frames a river like a gate
To revelation, and among the beasts
That live, and hide, and have their being. Of
Other things like picnics, not what priests
Provide, and gems of friendship and of love
We picked among the flower fields of dance
At morning and in evening by the fire.
We told each other stories, knight and lance.
At dawn and dusk we raised our souls up higher
To peaks and sky. The weather helped us molt
Our lower selves and sent a lightning bolt.
~ Phillip Whidden