This had to blast a hole in the night,
And interrupt my sleep—
So I might stay awake—
To write a poem to make her weep.
But weep she never will.
The world’s crammed. She’s had her fill.
They squelched you. Why?
Every store and library has Lloyd, but not you.
It almost makes me want to cry.
Delmore, they are taking your words away,
And using them in electronic crosswords.
You would be dismayed—or maybe, resigned.
You were intimate with nitpicking society, and every kind
Of Harvard scholar and pill.
You burned with introspection and good will.
You separated yourself out,
To find knowledge in yourself in doubt.
Yours was a Freudian Era—
Marked by Marxist separation, ego, error.
I heard you couldn’t sleep—
But you weren’t one to weep.
You were noble, and nobly great.
But a stammerer, and after introductions,
Anxiously scintillating. But, by then, too late.
Your family never settled down,
So you couldn’t just get around.
We need to introduce everyone to your Socrates, again,
The women are getting bored with all the boring men.
They are shaping us into shapes, again.
You, at least had Freud, Dante, and Marx.
Now we are pacified into one,
A boiling, confused, placid sun.
A little like your face you hated.
The great mind! But sad and fated.
You should see us now! Looking into our phones!
Gazing at these devices—as if they were eternity!
Delmore, I think they are.
Devices loading pictures still—by the time we join your star.