“The Lady Has a Point” | Poems by Massey

May 4, 2014 by Peter Galen Massey

The Lady Has a Point

“Well that one was happiness,” says my wife.
“Cut my throat, jump a bridge, take my life.”
You didn’t like it? “I liked it fine. It’s all the
Darkness I could leave behind.” That’s not me.
“Really?” Those words are the stone demons that show
Black angels have been cast from the temple of my soul.
“Okay sure. But if you must in the quarry of poetry toil,
How ‘bout a little more cathedral, a little less gargoyle?”

Posted in On Books | Tagged Poems | 2 Comments

2 Responses

on May 4, 2014 at 7:15 pm | Reply johnmcellhenney

One explanation of gargoyles is that they made it possible to pee demons out of the cathedral; yes, my wording is coarse, but I suspect it is closer to the words used by people in the Middle Ages than our uppity Latinate words are. In any case, expressing darkness may be a way to clear space for light.
on May 4, 2014 at 8:03 pm | Reply Peter Galen Massey

I believe I stole the essence of the idea from Nabokov, who said something similar about gargoyles in reference to Lolita, I think. The trick to stealing is to know from whom!