This Pestering Present Moment

There is more going on formally in this little poem than first meets the eye. The first four lines of each stanza are alternating iambic trimeters and trochaic tetrameters, and lines one and three have feminine endings. The final four lines of each stanza are alternating iambic tetrameters and trimeters, with lines five and seven ending in three-syllable words (well, four syllable in the second stanza, line seven). The rhyme scheme is obvious.

   For a much different approach to the endless present moments of time, here's a link to my free verse poem "Works and Days" written in May 1979 and posted here on 10 May 2012..

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   This pestering present moment
Stabs its goad and stings the mind;
   Indicting, never dormant,
Leaves no trespass unassigned:
            By self-division endlessly
            It births the endless now,
            Thus blighting all to guiltily
            Do all that sins allow.

   You cheated, lied, you slandered,
Pardoned self but not your friend,
   But appetites unlaundered
Flinder truth and never mend.
            Insist if must that frabjously
            The sated self’s at peace,
            But consequence will hideously
            Griddle you in your grease.

   And what is truth? laughed Pilate,
Truth’s my free-for-all, growled time,
   Where lust barebacks your wallet,
Mocks your groans as pantomime:
            It’s hate, it’s graft, and shamelessly
            Enthrals your grasping eyes;
            It sells you time-share earnestly
            But damns you to the sties.

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© April 2022