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This poem is taken from PN Review 129, Volume 26 Number 1, September - October 1999.

Three Poems Chris Wallace-Crabbe

The Missing Lyric

Somewhere in the corner of every life
there lurks or lies a poem that was lost;

it haunts the corners of your consciousness;
you blame yourself (or else the Universe).

The poem snuggles in its private corner.
Its lines are down there humming secretly,

thinking of you. It's having guilty dreams,
and schemes, or dark reflections, out of sight,

feeling it popped you into an oubliette.
It's really quite ashamed, now, of itself,

having been told to take good care of you.
Come on, it sobs, come back and pick me up.

Afternoon, morning, just remember this:
the poem thinks of life as hide-and-seek.


In the Scent of Eucalyptus

Full moonlight shows her out there after all,
...


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