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< lines that are stuck in my head
Today I spent a good 20 minutes trying to remember the name of a poem I discovered in a high school literature book of all places over a decade ago (public school lit seemed generally milquetoast). It turned out to be
Her Lips Are Copper Wire by Jean Toomer:
whisper of yellow globes
gleaming on lamp-posts that sway
like bootleg licker drinkers in the fog
and let your breath be moist against me
like bright beads on yellow globes
telephone the power-house
that the main wires are insulate
(her words play softly up and down
dewy corridors of billboards)
then with your tongue remove the tape
and press your lips to mine
till they are incandescent
While not well read in poetry enough to claim it as a favorite, I will say that it is very special to me as a piece that showed me what poetry could be.
this is such a pretty poem. a lot of people think that love is overrepresented in poetry and art in general, but there are so many forms of love; perhaps love is the point of it all.
(and i also learnt the meaning of the word 'milquetoast'. that's fun!)
i'm taking literature in school now—we just finished a unit on short stories, and Oh Boy did it give me such an insight into the power of symbolism and stories.