Friday, September 26, 2008

Homecoming

 

I think I tend to be too wordy. Not only in my poems, sometimes, but in my commentary, too. Sorry about that.

Still, I do try to boil things down ... to reduce them to their essence. Readers are busy, in a hurry, have other things to do, so many other things calling for their attention.

I owe them some brevity ... and the more I talk about that, the less I'm giving them. Right?

What I started out to say was that the poem simply attempts to express the feeling that, while it's good to get away ... on a vacation, or even for a few days ... it's good to get back, too ... to be home again.

I could have said much more than that, but I was under the mistaken impression that Capper's only published eight-line poems ... with short lines, at that.

For example, I could have talked about the curving gravel road leading to the barn on the place where I lived at one time ... about the lilacs and maples along that road ... about the big gray house ... the light in the window ...

More about that later, perhaps. For now, the poem:

 

HOMECOMING

No matter how great

the vacation, there's

no sweeter song

than a quartet

of travel-weary tires

harmonizing

on the gravel

of your own driveway.

© 1994

(originally published in Capper's)

 

 

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Today's word: harmonizing

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I don't think you are ever too wordy.  It's nice read your commentaries and I often wonder how you come up with things to write about each day :)

Harmonizing is a wonderful word.  Evocative...