Poets United Midweek Motif ~ Ninety / The Nineties

“I heard one presidential candidate say that what this country 
needed was a president for the nineties. I was set to run again. 
I thought he said a president IN his nineties.” 
― Ronald Reagan, Speaking My Mind: Selected Speeches

“She's all brute force and '90s clichés.” 
― Rainbow Rowell, Carry On

“People have told me 'Betty, Facebook is a great way to keep in touch with 

old friends....'  At my age, if I wanted to keep in touch 
with old friends, I'd need a Ouija board” 
― Betty White

Midweek Motif ~ 

Ninety / The Nineties

Because this is Leap Year, March 30th is the 90th day of the year. Let's celebrate the number 90 and ninety minutes, ninetieth days, ninetieth years, the  1990s or the 1890s:

The Gay Nineties is an American nostalgic term referring to the decade of the 1890s. It is known in the United Kingdom as the Naughty Nineties, and refers there to the decade of supposedly decadent art by Aubrey Beardsley, the witty plays and trial of Oscar Wilde, society scandals and the beginning of the suffragette movement).

(Note that in the USA, we are just beginning to expose the history of the 1890s from other than white points of view.  That's why I include the Lucille Clifton poem below.  I wonder if that is true of other locations as well?)

 Your Challenge:  Today you have a vast choice of subject: the 90s.  There are two cautions: (1) write a new poem and (2) let your theme echo in your poem like a motif in music.  One way to do that is by refrain or repetition, but there are many other ways.  Enjoy.

The City's Oldest Known Survivor of the Great War

BY JAMES DOYLE

marches in uniform down the traffic stripe

at the center of the street, counts time

to the unseen web that has rearranged

the air around him, his left hand

stiff as a leather strap along his side,

the other saluting right through the decades

as if they weren't there, as if everyone under ninety

were pervasive fog the morning would dispel

in its own good time, as if the high school band

all flapping thighs and cuffs behind him

were as ghostly as the tumbleweed on every road

dead-ended in the present, all the ancient infantry

shoulder right, through a skein of bone, presenting arms

across the drift, nothing but empty graves now

to round off another century,

the sweet honey of the old cadence, the streets

going by at attention, the banners glistening with dew,

the wives and children blowing kisses.

The Old Man's Complaints. And how he gained them

BY ROBERT SOUTHEY

You are old, Father William, the young man cried,

The few locks which are left you are grey;

You are hale, Father William, a hearty old man,

Now tell me the reason I pray.

In the days of my youth, Father William replied,

I remember'd that youth would fly fast,

And abused not my health and my vigour at first

That I never might need them at last.

You are old, Father William, the young man cried,

And pleasures with youth pass away,

And yet you lament not the days that are gone,

Now tell me the reason I pray.

In the days of my youth, Father William replied,

I remember'd that youth could not last;

I thought of the future whatever I did,

That I never might grieve for the past.

You are old, Father William, the young man cried,

And life must be hastening away;

You are chearful, and love to converse upon death!

Now tell me the reason I pray.

I am chearful, young man, Father William replied,

Let the cause thy attention engage;

In the days of my youth I remember'd my God!

And He hath not forgotten my age.

mulberry fields

BY LUCILLE CLIFTON

they thought the field was wasting

and so they gathered the marker rocks and stones and

piled them into a barn    they say that the rocks were shaped

some of them scratched with triangles and other forms    they

must have been trying to invent some new language they say

the rocks went to build that wall there guarding the manor and

some few were used for the state house

crops refused to grow

i say the stones marked an old tongue and it was called eternity

and pointed toward the river    i say that after that collection

no pillow in the big house dreamed    i say that somewhere under

here moulders one called alice whose great grandson is old now

too and refuses to talk about slavery    i say that at the

masters table only one plate is set for supper    i say no seed

can flourish on this ground once planted then forsaken    wild

berries warm a field of bones

bloom how you must i say

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Please share your new poem using Mr. Linky below and visit others in the spirit of the community.

                                     (Next week Susan's Midweek will be ~ Citizenship)

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