Don't Leave Hungry: Fifty Years of Southern Poetry Review

Two Old People

R O B E RT WAT S O N Two Old People Let the houses fall. Let them flick down those that choose To stand in the brash wind. Help the wind blow the whole town down To a rubbish heap. Send the Mayor matches. Let him light the pile. Let them dance around the flames Until the wind has twirled the town away. Let us, backs to the light of the fire, Read some book against wind, Against fire, Pranks. Let us read a book Old, awkward, tedious as we To hold against the clever wind. Let us read a story Of a man, a woman Who built a house That men and wind and fire conspired against. A story of a man, a woman Who reading a book Yawn Into the straight, steady rain 26 ❚ The Late 1950s and the 1960s Of sleep, a rain of a late autumn Day with nothing to do But watch the fire purring in the fireplace. The Late 1950s and the 1960s ❚ 27 ...