The Oldest Living Thing In L.a. Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOMPQRS TUVW| At Wilshire Santa Monica I saw an opossum | A |
| Trying to cross the street It was late the street | B |
| Was brightly lit the opossum would take | C |
| A few steps forward then back away from the breath | D |
| Of moving traffic People coming out of the bars | E |
| Would approach as if to help it somehow | F |
| It would lift its black lips show them | G |
| The reddened gums the long rows of incisors | H |
| Teeth that went all the way back beyond | I |
| The flames of Troy Carthage beyond sheep | J |
| Grazing rock strewn hills fragments of ruins | K |
| In the grass at San Vitale It would back away | L |
| Delicately smoothly stepping carefully | M |
| As it always had It could mangle someone s hand | N |
| In twenty seconds Mangle it for good It could | O |
| Sever it completely from the wrist in forty | M |
| There was nothing to be done for it Someone | P |
| Or other probably called the LAPD who then | Q |
| Called Animal Control who woke a driver who | R |
| Then dressed in mailed gloves the kind of thing | S |
| Small knights once wore into battle who gathered | T |
| Together his pole with a noose on the end | U |
| A light steel net to snare it with someone who hoped | V |
| The thing would have vanished by the time he got there | W |
Larry Levis
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