Imperial Valley press., 1936-11-29
"REMINISCENCES
X OF A ROVER
OBSCURITIES
OBSCURITIES
BY Whit Wellman

BY Whit Wellman
A CROSS the desk occasionally comes verse
u drifting in from various spots in the
world Evidently everyone, sooner or later, takes
to verse as a means Of expressing what prose
fails to give--a compact form into which lad
may pour emotions hopes and fears
Moods and verse are heeting things II
Is suitable that one be used TO contain, now
ever briefly the other
From Arizona and Oregon came the follow
ing sonnets and other verse by John Adler. He
seldom stays in one place long enough to use
the some post-mark twice. OF his contributions,
his sonnets are perhaps the best even though
some still cling to free form, or to no FORM
at all like modernistic artists.
IDOL SHOP
Lords of the ghostland wait here row on row;
Amused they speculate nourished on dust
Of centuries soft clothed with doom to Know
All mortals dying breath immortal lust
Cry out before the altar of Ishtar
Give sacrifice to obese Baal where sons
Reveal divinity 8. to one blue star
Within starless night of bronze belongs
That ageless. sad mirage of gods desire.
O. Nebo! Prophet of that empty mist
Who comes? These patient gods Of Ur will
tire
Of fattery Ghosts only come, strange list
Of royal dead each to his god, now high
On shndow shelves of Time where all prayers
die
JAZZ REQUIEM
Her lover lost, dear sister plays the sweet
Old fashioned songs of twenty years ago;
Cool songs of hoyhocks, of waltzng feet,
Of gardens walled by oaks and mstetoe
And then, remembering the tall pale line
Of roses gone to seed thin stalks OF rain
Against the moon whose skeleton design
ratrn al
Through frantic fingers hammers wave on
browns beating terror with jazz requiem
Of savage sound. There lonely echoes brave
A creeping death songs will ever stem
Defeat invisible has come, to prove
Dark silences are stronger than Is love-
VICTORY
Enchanted hell was cold: that scarlet flame
Which lit its flares beside the open door
OF my cathedral, died and softly came
Hes grinning gargoyles marching back with
more
Than memories to taunt my blurring sight.
They pointed fingers at my window, where
Gray dusk filled every Granny, and the light
Grew ever less before the altar there
I smiled, as worshippers to vanished things
At last may smile lonely, faint grimace.
Then suddenly candle cleaned, and rings
OF torches shone within the twilight place;
I'd one great candle in a golden bowl
Besieged the dark battalions of my soul
JUNGLE COAST
Up from the south comes the sound of wild,
weird music -.
Music of the hidden forests and unseen
places,
Of tropic coasts where the sands are hot and
dry,
Where vine-covered trees press to the edge
of the blue,
Softly at first born on the breath of the sea,
Bearing faint fragrance of white flowers
Alluring sweetness of forgotten days.
Music of silent nights when the sea is dead
And the forest still -.
When the sky is an expanse of black,
With here and there furtive light,
Pickering blown out, and back
BY breath
Our friend grows mystical on occasion, he ad-
mits under pressure; obscure, said to be
the privilege of versifers. license of which
may take full advantage poetic or otherwise
as indicated in these four stanzas
NO WIND WILL STIR
She sings of dark blind-alleys where
stranger paradise is found
OF asters sprung from swamp and air E..
In vagrant beauty, unrenowned .
"As each things visible to me
Is but the shadowed, trembling veil
OF secrets lost shall not see &.
So in their telling, ever fail"
She sings of those who wilfu seek
Exotic scents down curving lane
Up unexpored and moon-kissed creek
Remembering joy, dsmissing pain -.
"Yet no winds stir this white-set gloom,
No cry will pierce the wilderness
OF thought, where desolate will loom
But half a memory, or less :"
Like other and harder working people, those
who make verse often have an idea that re
fuses to work out and there's nothing to
do but stop. Adler, in this case, paused after
two stanzas found it impossible to go on i.
IDEA WITHOUT A TITLE
Wed anchored fast in the emerald BAY
Within a coral reef
Just as the last of that weary day
Showed where the isle and jungle lay "
Beauty beyond belief