Wednesday, December 23, 2020

Epitaph for An Astronomer

Read "Epitaph for An Astronomer" at The Eldritch Dark:


This second in the series of "Quintrains" from Clark Ashton Smith (CAS) is a great example of a poem where the title is absolutely integral to the complete work; without it, the opening line "Shall he find" would be ambiguous.  

So in a sense, these are really six-line poems, and I'm beginning to appreciate that although the Quintrains are longer than the haiku form with which CAS would soon be experimenting, the six-liner already demonstrates the poet's aptitude in distilling and expressing ideas with great economy.  Even in his early fifties, CAS was still discovering new poetic techniques, and always doing so with great skill.


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