"I know noble accents
And lucid, inescapable rhythms"
----Wallace Stevens
"Thirteen Ways of Looking at Blackbird"
Timothy Murphy
Timothy Murphy's books are The Deed of Gift, Story Line Press, 1998; Set the Ploughshare Deep, Ohio University Press, 2000; Very Far North, Waywiser Press (London), 2002; and Beowulf, A Longman Cultural Edition, 2004.
Timothy Murphy
The Manly Arts
How to run the table
or shoot doubles on
cocks,
lead a mare from her stable,
tan the skin of a
fox—
how to batten a hatch
and trim a working jib,
light fires
without a match
or grill, without a bib—
these are tasks that a boy
must master every day
to his sorrow or
joy—
even if he is gay.
www.lucidrhythyms.com
© 2008 David Landrum