Poetry Gives Off Smoke Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDCDDEDFDDFGHIJKCC FCLMNOPDQRSTUVSWUXCF YCDZFDA2LB2C DDUDC2D D2Y E2| Poetry gives off smoke | A |
| but it doesn't die out | B |
| It acts kind of crazy flutteringly | C |
| when it chooses us | D |
| This fellow's no fool | C |
| sucking tranquillizers | D |
| toting in a little briefcase | D |
| a boiled beet root | E |
| Right now he'd like a mousse | D |
| or baba au rhum | F |
| but the Muse | D |
| some kind of Muse | D |
| grabs him | F |
| by the scruff of the neck | G |
| Thoughts drill a hole in his forehead | H |
| and he's mislaid the spoon | I |
| and he's a giant Socrates for the Lord's sake | J |
| in an Oblomov dust jacket O K | K |
| he's no Apollo | C |
| he's puny and ugly | C |
| skinny he's like a golden mushroom | F |
| unsteady | C |
| transparent | L |
| But suddenly some sort of whistling | M |
| is in his ears and then | N |
| a period | O |
| And like a slugger's hook | P |
| across the chops of the ages | D |
| a line | Q |
| And there | R |
| an insane little bird | S |
| falls off its feet | T |
| a crazy rag picker | U |
| drunk | V |
| a kind of society clown But something gives her the word | S |
| and | W |
| like branches in winter | U |
| God rings from within and her eyelids turn | X |
| to marble | C |
| And here's a bum | F |
| a shaman | Y |
| really | C |
| from among the lunatics | D |
| Pour him champagne | Z |
| bring him | F |
| women not rum cakes | D |
| Suddenly an order from within | A2 |
| will come through sternly and he's the instant | L |
| voice of the people damned near | B2 |
| Savonarola | C |
| - | |
| Poetry acts kind of strange it flutters | D |
| when it chooses us | D |
| And it has no mercy either | U |
| afterwards It stamps 'Pure Souls' | D |
| on us but who's the judge | C2 |
| Yes | D |
| for the horse blinkered multitudes we're 'decadents ' | - |
| but for ourselves we ourselves are are | D2 |
| well yes Redemption | Y |
| - | |
| - | |
| Translated by James Dickey with Anthony Kahn | E2 |
Yevgeny Yevtushenko
(1)
Poem topics: , Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
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