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Michael Shepherd - Footnote to a famous poem

2014-06-12 9 Dailymotion

You all know it from the classroom. <br />It’s in all the anthologies. <br />Many say it’s his best; ‘a young man’s poem’ <br />full of life and love and promise; <br />and short too. His long poems, <br />they’re great but few have the patience now <br />and who cares about Poet Laureates <br />when they’re out of fashion? <br /> <br />It never appeared, did you know, <br />in his lifetime. Sat in his desk drawer, <br />a single poem in a fine Italian leather folder. <br />His wife left it there after he died; <br />remembering when he’d sent it to her <br />the night before their marriage; she caught him <br />once, sitting there, an old man reading <br />a young man’s poem; closed the door quietly, <br />said nothing. <br /> <br />They cleared the house after she died. <br />It would never have come to light <br />if years later his mistress hadn’t left <br />a copy – it transpired - to the museum <br />in her will; he’d written it just for her, she said; <br />but made her promise not to publish it. <br />She felt she owed it to his memory though. <br /> <br />Some people prefer not to have <br />footnotes to poems; they say <br />they spoil the poem, <br />and cheapen a great man; <br />some people like them; they say <br />it makes poets seem more human.<br /><br />Michael Shepherd<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/footnote-to-a-famous-poem/

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