Vol. 8 No. 5 1941 - page 382

Three Key West Poems
382
Elizabeth Bishop
JERONYMO'S HOUSE
My house, my fairy
palace, is
of perishable
clapboards with
three rooms in all,
my gray wasps' nest
of chewed-up paper
glued with spit.
My home, my love-nest,
is endowed
with a verandah
of wooden lace,
adorned with f ems
planted in sponges,
and the front room .
with red and green
left-over Christmas
decorations
looped from the corners
to the middle
above my little
center table
of woven wicker
painted blue,
and four blue chairs
and an affair
for the smallest baby
with a tray
with ten big beads.
Then on the wall
two palm-leaf fans
and a calendar