Metaphoric Mist Poem by gershon hepner

Metaphoric mist,
like similes that rain
upon the page resist
the meaning that is plain,

Artifice that feeds
the poet's parking meter,
mixed metaphors, like weeds,
may need an exegeter.

Precious is the prism,
the rainbow of the image
of metaphoric scrimmage,
as neat as neologism.


Richard Jenkyns reviews 'Virgil: His Life and Times, ' by Peter Levi (St. Martin's Press) and 'The Eclogues of Virgil: A Translation by David Ferry' (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) in 'Immemorial Elms' (TNR) , August 30,1999) . He quotes Levi with approval: 'Dido comes with her crowd of young men and her mist of metaphor.'


8/24/99