Imogene Wagner

Lovely
Coquettish maids
Peeking painted faces
Coyly from under tilted green
...

Oh, listen! Listen closely now
And breathe no sound to interfere...
I put the needle on the record, there!
And now the music comes to tell the ear.
...

I thank the heart for being
A store house free to spend
Love foolishly and liberally
On every new found friend;
...

Sweet, sweet, you are the music of my heart
Playing its Overture of Adoration;
Soft violins that plead their Spirit's strings
Into my sense to lure the soul's elation,
...

I come on hurried running feet,
Annoyed with time,
Vexed with the lady down the street
Hunting a dime-
...

He stained my glasses with harsh words
And for that day
I looked upon the world of men
all dirty grey.
...

I searched my bed indignantly,
It seemed I laid on stones
But in surprise I found that I
Was laying on my bones!
...

I

In Spring
Your memory
...

Hope is a fragile bubble,
Opalescent starred,
That bursts when callous trouble
Breathes on it too hard.
...

It's just a mortal gesture, I don't know
Why people word goodbye when good friends go,
But somehow social unrest tangles me
Into this act, as if a sentence free
...

You woo me like a dominating lover
Slowly touching fire to every part,
Bending me to reverence, you uncover
All the secret places of my heart.
...

Around my wrist I wear a watch
Upon my body clothes,
I always wear a hat to church
And sport no shiny nose;
...

I am the curious one, who finding flowers,
Take them all apart to find their depth,
And holding their broke petals in my hands
See I have destroyed their deepest powers.
...

I don't mind dentists
when they hurt your feelings,
by boring or extracting your best grinder,
But it gets my goat when
...

I'm a sittin' by my window
A listenin' for the “tello”
A wishin' hard on all the stars
My heart a tight strung cello.
...

She rested on the hill above the graves
And smiled in the moment's consecration,
To find that death proclaimed its time in shades
Variant as the grass blades recreation;
...

“Look Sis, you're only five and kinda dumb
But I have got to tell you anyway,
I heard 'em talkin'! - now, don't you tell Mum,
They said that Dad ain't ours no more to stay.
...

Upon the silver screen the news was shown;
A train derailed and fifty dead,
The closed-faced Commies saying No again,
And Europe's hungry children clutching bread.
...

The phone rang at midnight, fearful I rain
Into the table and jarred the divan,
Trembling hands lifted the piece to my ear
“Daddy? ” Oh, Daddy! Yes, Yes, I hear,
...

The thought came to me like a vagrant bird
To land here in the branches of my mind
To sing its song of lifting melody
And sire a spirit child of ecstasy.
...