M. Degas Teaches Art & Science At Durfee Intermediate School–Detroit, 1942
by Philip Levine
He made a line on the blackboard,
one bold stroke from right to left
diagonally downward and stood back
to ask, looking as always at no one
in particular, “What have I done?”
From the back of the room Freddie
shouted, “You’ve broken a piece
of chalk.” M. Degas did not smile.
“What have I done?” he repeated.
The most intellectual students
looked down to study their desks
except for Gertrude Bimmler, who raised
her hand before she spoke. “M. Degas,
you have created the hypotenuse
of an isosceles triangle.” Degas mused.
Everyone knew that Gertrude could not
be incorrect. “It is possible,”
Louis Warshowsky added precisely,
“that you have begun to represent
the roof of a barn.” I remember
that it was exactly twenty minutes
past eleven, and I thought at worst
this would go on another forty
minutes. It was early April,
the snow had all but melted on
the playgrounds, the elms and maples
bordering the cracked walks shivered
in the new winds, and I believed
that before I knew it I’d be
swaggering to the candy store
for a Milky Way. M. Degas
pursed his lips, and the room
stilled until the long hand
of the clock moved to twenty one
as though in complicity with Gertrude,
who added confidently, “You’ve begun
to separate the dark from the dark.”
I looked back for help, but now
the trees bucked and quaked, and I
knew this could go on forever.
End of the poem
15 random poems
- Валерий Брюсов – Гимн Нилу
- The Deserted Garden
- Robert Burns: Farewell Thou Stream:
- Кондратий Рылеев – Как солнце ни блестит и как оно ни светит
- November by William Cullen Bryant
- Eternity by William Blake
- To Don Quixote, Translation of Paul Verlaine’s A Don Quichotte by T. Wignesan.
- Владимир Маяковский – Смыкай ряды
- Amoraphobia by Shaunna Harper
- Валерий Брюсов – Глупое сердце, о чем же печалиться
- On The Queen’s Visit To London, The Night Of The 17th March 1789 by William Cowper
- French Revolution, The (excerpt) by William Blake
- Dead Musicians by Siegfried Sassoon
- Hymn To Apollo poem – John Keats poems
- Sonnet To Mrs. Reynolds’s Cat poem – John Keats poems
Some external links:
Duckduckgo.com – the alternative in the US
Quant.com – a search engine from France, and also an alternative, at least for Europe
Yandex – the Russian search engine (it’s probably the best search engine for image searches).
Philip Levine ( 1928 – 2015) was an American poet best known for his poems about working-class Detroit. He taught for more than thirty years in the English department of California State University, Fresno and held teaching positions at other universities as well. He served on the Board of Chancellors of the Academy of American Poets from 2000 to 2006, and was appointed Poet Laureate of the United States for 2011–2012