18
PARTISAN REVIEW
"Mercy," broke out Miss Jenks who hadn't said much during
dinner because her new set of false teeth bothered her, but had
sat there with her little bright lined face munching fast like a rabbit.
"You wouldn't think the war was over would you?"
Then Aunt Harriet suggested Glenn take his little cousin Lorna
for a walk around the zoo. Lorna pushed her face out in a big pout
and said she hated the old zoo but all the aunts and cousins thought
it was a lovely idea and Uncle Glenn gave them a half dollar to
buy peanuts for the elephant with and they were bundled up and
shooed out of the house into the chilly twilight of the streets.
Simple Progression
I.
THE MILL
Looking and listening with eye and ear
for birds, alive in woods }Ve've seldom seen;
going with every season of the year,
we have had just that sidewalk glimpse of green
one gets in passing by. Early and late,
in sun or when rain dripped from boughs and eaves,
we've tried to carry through the clockhouse gate
our thoughts of grass, our memories of leaves.
II.
THE SKY
That is our sunset of which we are justly proud:
a fourcolor film projected on air and cloud,
a continent-length mirage, a barrage of news–
grander, I sometimes think, than a rainbow's hues
that curve to a pot of gold or a Comstock Lode.
Time prints a lithograph now where the rainbow showed:
yellow, red, violet, green, it becomes terrific
before its colors dissolve in the dark Pacific.
WILLIAM STEPHENS
