Poems from Late 1939
Hello, can you suggest to me other poems written in late 1939? There is, of course, Auden’s “September 1939,” and I have been looking at Roethke’s “Lull (November 1939).” I am struck by how similar the tone, form and even the diction are to Auden’s poem:
Lull
The winds of hatred blow
Cold, cold across the flesh
And chill the anxious heart;
Intricate phobias grow
From each malignant wish
To spoil collective life.
Now each man stands apart.
We watch opinion drift,
Think of our separate skins.
On well-upholstered bums
The generals cough and shift
Playing with painted pins.
The arbitrators wait;
The newsmen suck their thumbs.
The mind is quick to turn
Away from simple faith
To the cant and fury of
Fools who will never learn;
Reason embraces death,
While out of frightened eyes
Still stares the wish to love.
__________________
Aaron Poochigian
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