Margie-Lee Runbeck - 4 Short Poems (1921-26)

Forgotten Poems #93 || Reissue #10

“Learning is rebellion… Every bit of new truth discovered is revolutionary to what was believed before.” (Margie-Lee Runbeck, in The Year of Love, 1956)

    
                —: Twilight :—

        My neighbor
        Is putting her little boys to bed.
        Over my hedge
        Their laughter comes to me
        In amber puffs like smoke
        That roll and uncoil
        And wrap around my throat
        Chokingly.
    

    
                —: Poem :—

        From my lowered eyes, I watch him
        Eating his dinner,
        And thinking of something else—
        Of the poem he is going to write to me.
        What would he do, if I were to say,
        “Oh, John, do you like the poem I made you?

        You are eating it now, dear!”
        When I sliced the cucumbers
        Carefully on the lettuce
        I said, “These will be pond-lilies
        On their pads that John loves.”
        When I heaped the raspberries
        In a dull green bowl
        It was because of the haw-tree—
                remember?

        Oh, hear my poems, John!
        They are telling you
        What yours tell me.
    

   
                —: Evanescence :—

        A white flame of moonlight
        Struck a mauve poppy
        And kindled it to silver
        In my garden.
        But suddenly
        It blurred to ashes
        Under a cloud,
             Reminding me of you.
   

    
                —: Hope :—

        Over the flare of the candle
        Your gaze slouches indolently
        To mine.
        Your china cheeks flush with constant color
        But it is your mouth,
        Profaned by its tiny cigarette
        That I am watching.

        Once
        On a transparent morning
        A coal-eyed girl.
        Walked with me in the wind
        To the eyebrow of a hill.
        And wordlessly
        We talked.
        Once
        On a triumphant morning.

        You have the mouth
        Of that girl.
        Do you suppose
        I could build her up again
        With only a mouth to start from?
   

Margie-Lee Runbeck (1905-1956) was “a journalist by profession,” originally a Southerner, “who now lives in Brookline, Boston, in Massachusetts. She is the author of Changeable Silks a volume of verse shortly to appear.” (The Double Dealer, 1924) “Writes for the Christian Science Monitor and other papers, running a summer camp in Plymouth for variety.” (Poetry, 1924) Later left journalism to become an educator, and in the 1940s went on two publish numerous short-stories, novels, and non-fiction books.

“I believe that throughout the world emphasis is shifting from head-importance to heart-importance. We had come to a moment in history where ‘progress’ seemed to add up to global suicide… if we are to survive it must be through understanding and through the almost unimaginable miracle of global love.” (from a radio interview with Runbeck)

     
             For Margie-Lee Runbeck
                     By Dick Whyte

       dusk—

       the carillon bells
       bulbous
       with sound

       ringing in my ears,
       little gods
       unborn
    

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