Idealism Revisited Poem by Donna Ialongo

promises
can make all dandelions Italian
with brothy eyes.

caught in the makeshift world
of innocence,
dandelions are sunflowers
and sunflowers lose the bottom half
of their name.

but mud-lusty villains
spatter and gurgle and dust-up
the sunbeams.
see how the villain begins to ressemble
that puny dandelion
with only guts enough
to destroy grass
(the stuff that love is made of)
(the stuff that love was made of)

poets never die
they are simply murdered in others' memories
those of half-lovers
and whole lovers unloved.

bit by bit
olde written words
are choked back in one poet's throat
never to be swallowed
because they squirm on the white printed page
and give immortality to mistakes and
promises.

(August 23,1966)