A La Fin / You're Only Dead Once by Jack D. Harvey

A La Fin

In the night of love,
in the light of love,
we repair the ravaged goddess;
tinkling bells, a ballad worn out;
love,
hanging heavy on the heart,
love,
like a sunken boat,
green in the sea,
love like a
delicate ivory contraption,
love’s body like a strong soldier,

stronger in battle.





You’re Only Dead Once
(Odyssey Book XI- Nekuia)

Farming not at all
we like,
the pasture boggy and
the day dirt-long with toil.

In the kingdom of the dead
Achilles’ flap
about working a live sharecropper
than ruling the death-house-
he must have been kidding.

He was.

Toil is lady luck’s backside,
unfurnished and smelly;
give me ghosts and
the rest of eternity.

Jack D. Harvey’s poetry has appeared in The Comstock Review, Valparaiso Poetry Review, Typishly Literary Magazine, The Antioch Review and elsewhere. The author has been a Pushcart nominee and over the years has been published in a few anthologies. The author has been writing poetry since he was sixteen and lives in a small town near Albany, New York.