— For Archibald MacLeish

again the voices of yesterday
grant permission to our young

MacLeish heard them all the way home
trekking through blinding snow
to tell Ada things would be different
he would not accept the partnership

a man of letters and certain deeds
anyway enough with poetic attorneys

did she embrace her lover of words
a lone gargoyle protecting his goals
as if she could reach so far
despite her own abandoned hope

they crossed the Atlantic to Paris
searching for space and silence

like Toklas and Stein after midnight
Picasso till the light was gone
Fitzgerald at The Dingo don’t go
Hemingway cornered at Les Deux Magot

Gerald Murphy said it best
only the invented part of life is worth living

Archie befriended bohemian ghosts
calling from centuries-old garden beds
bent his ear toward their haunting
filling basilica halls even now

it’s all about masterpieces
and the sound of the Seine is nice too

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