Serenade
An acrostic golden shovel poem
by Michael Escoubas

The man bent over his guitar, A shearsman of sorts. The day was green.

From The Man with the Blue Guitar, by Wallace Stevens, 1937.

Whenever folks gather to talk about poetry, The
Attention, sooner or later, turns to the man
Long admired for his symphonic genius. Bent
Like one burdened in his spirit, he imagined over
Again and again his accents and syllabications, his
Creations of sound and sense chimed in his mind. His guitar,
Earthy in erudite sayings, in ideas of order, A
Stalwart champion of free thought, a shearsman
That strums his tunes on poetic strings, of
Enquiry. He enters the spiritual realm as one who sorts,
Variations of truth evoked by moonlight when The
Evening air is thick with summer’s spices, and day
Never ceases unleashing poetry’s pleasures. Life, for him, was
Singing summer’s songs of sun and sea and palms glistening green.



 

Return to: