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The Demosthenian Literary Society
The nobler and loftier days, gone by,
The auld lang syne of the decades that fly,
The vast contemplation of time and of space,
The fast moving spirits of truth and of grace,
The panes in the windows were wavy and old,
But mainly, back then, we were brilliant and bold.
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At Indian Boundary
I drove up to the lake to see
A turning golden poplar tree,
And bending down upon the shore,
A burning one of golden more.
I wondered why I’d wished to go
And thought I’d blundered, rushing so—
Some type of cure from all that’s stressed,
As wrote John Muir, when called—out West.
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Note: “The mountains are calling, and I must go” – John Muir
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Alec Ream is a writer living in Virginia. His poetic work and creative fiction have been widely published. A member of the Demosthenian Literary Society at UGA, he wrote on Lookout Mountain, and continued to write, lecture and work for Delta Kappa Epsilon HQ. He was first published reading to the pledge class of Michigan DKE, in Ann Arbor in 2008. Recently, his poem Green Fire was read at the Washington Literary Society & Debating Union at UVA.
These are yet another excercise in how to end a poem.
Well done!
I can’t say that I ever thought of myself as being “brilliant.” Brash, perhaps. I appreciate Mr. Ream’s honesty in placing his own flirtation with brilliance in the past tense. As for things being “nobler and loftier” in the days of yore, it is clear in the second poem that Mr. Ream is still able to experience such things in the present . . . at least in nature. Our mutual lack of brilliance perhaps explains both the existence of the phrase “a burning one of golden more” and my inability to make sense of it.
I love “our mutual lack of brilliance” – count me in!
Mr. Tweedie: I think you are probably more brilliant than most of us. Sometimes people make up nonsense in order to create a rhyme.
I’ve been remiss – thank you…several of you…very…much – the things you say always have weight and are never ignored.
Demosthenian Literary Society at UGA – I don’t have the words to tell you how much it meant to be a part of it. Another aspect of my life which was “not popular,” and I wouldn’t trade it for the world.