YOUR rondeau's tale must still be light --
No bugle-call to life's stern fight!
Rather a smiling interlude
Memorial to some transient mood
Of idle love and gala-night.
Its manner is the merest sleight
O' hand; yet therein dwells its might,
For if the heavier touch intrude
Your rondeau's stale.
Fragrant and fragile, fleet and bright,
And wing'd with whim, it gleams in flight
Like April blossoms wind-pursued
Down aisles of tangled underwood; --
Nor be too serious when you write
Your rondeau's tail!
Leave a guest comment (subject to review)
Comments
-
Very funny!
First, it is a lovely rondeau, and the variations of the refrain still all sound alike, which I find very witty. His meter is bang-on and rhymes are deft, as one expects of his generation. (He also wrote fine free-verse.) The flights of description of the last stanza are perfectly beautiful as a metaphor for a fluffy passtime poem, but then he reminds us that he is joking with the final refrain. Don Marquis is one of my favorites.
Adding your comment:
