An Acre in the Seed
The sudden death of THEODORE SPENCER in his forty-sixth year came as a shock to all who knew him as poet, teacher, and scholar. Boylston Professor at Harvard and author of three volumes of verse and of a well-regarded study of Shakespeare, Ted Spencer was a generous and encouraging force in contemporary letters. W. H. Auden spoke for us all in a memorable letter to the New York Times: ”I have not only lost a friend. I have lost a trusted and not easily replaceable literary confessor.”
by THEODORE SPENCER
THE SATIRIST
OH do not think, because I make
Arrogant, wounded or unkind
Stabs at suffering, prowling man,
That I’m not deeply partisan
To all that fumbles in his mind —
Whence else these lines, and for whose sake?
Arrogant, wounded or unkind
Stabs at suffering, prowling man,
That I’m not deeply partisan
To all that fumbles in his mind —
Whence else these lines, and for whose sake?
THE PRODIGAL SON
THE family gone at last to bed,
He sauntered out to clear his head,
And saw geese hens pears plums hops grain,
His brother’s labor through the years.
How blame him that no father’s tears
Could keep him from the road again!
He sauntered out to clear his head,
And saw geese hens pears plums hops grain,
His brother’s labor through the years.
How blame him that no father’s tears
Could keep him from the road again!
THE MIND
HIGH to the ant this stalk of grass;
High to the grass this leap of tree;
High to this tree the moon, and high
As stars beyond the moon may be
Springs this reach of soaring I,
Sinks this plunging of Alas.
High to the grass this leap of tree;
High to this tree the moon, and high
As stars beyond the moon may be
Springs this reach of soaring I,
Sinks this plunging of Alas.
THE MUSE
No wonder man thought up the Muse.
How else explain who’s working when
For slow long hours all words refuse
To make the mind’s dark meaning plain
And then the right one flashes through
And a new world’s made in a world made new?
How else explain who’s working when
For slow long hours all words refuse
To make the mind’s dark meaning plain
And then the right one flashes through
And a new world’s made in a world made new?
AN IRIS
IN this mid-century slough where fear
Soaks aspiration in despair
And the swamp fog blurs all design,
Still may you see one flower flying
Its steady color and opulent line
Though poisoned at the root and dying.
Soaks aspiration in despair
And the swamp fog blurs all design,
Still may you see one flower flying
Its steady color and opulent line
Though poisoned at the root and dying.
THE PRESENCE
HERE in the dancing in the music in the shadows
Local in the moonlight and always in the sun
Here in the pastures and always in the meadows
Always by the roadside in the laughter and the fun
Here in forever and forever in today
In the lilies and the asters the goldenrod and hay.
Local in the moonlight and always in the sun
Here in the pastures and always in the meadows
Always by the roadside in the laughter and the fun
Here in forever and forever in today
In the lilies and the asters the goldenrod and hay.