The air smells of rhubarb, occasional

Roses, or first birth of blossoms, a fresh,

Undulant hurt, so body snaps and curls

Like flower. I step through snow as thin as script,

Watch white stars spin dizzy as drunks, and yearn               5

To sleep beneath a patchwork quilt of rum.

I want the slow, sure collapse of language

Washed out by alcohol. Lovely Shelley,

I have no use for measured, cadenced verse

If you won't read. Icarus-like, I'll fall                                  10

Against this page of snow, tumble blackly

Across vision to drown in the white sea

That closes every poem -- the white reverse

That cancels the blackness of each image.

1. What, in your view, is the central theme of this poem? What argument or point does the poet want to make here?

2. What kind (or genre) of poem is this? (See the title!) How does the poet develop or change or use this structure to make his argument?

3. Choose a key image or a key word from the poem and explain how it contributes to the theme you have noted in question 1.

4. Scan any line from the poem. How do rhythm and metre reinforce meaning in the poem?

5. What commentary on the nature and practice of writing -- whether writing poetry or writing in general -- does this poem make? How does the poem invite its readers to rethink the human relationship to language and meaning?